


The Park Is Open

by lannisterslioness



Category: Jurassic World (2015)
Genre: Baby Raptors, Dino Feels, F/M, Fluff and Angst, New Dinosaur, Park Re-Opening, Post I-Rex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-02
Updated: 2015-10-08
Packaged: 2018-04-18 13:48:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 25,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4708214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lannisterslioness/pseuds/lannisterslioness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Almost a year after Jurassic World has re-opened to the public; Claire and Owen are still picking up the pieces and trying to re-adjust to living on the island, together. However, as the allure of the park is waning again, the new cooperate head of Masrani Global has a few ideas for bringing the park back to life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. New Park, New Rules

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Well I have really no idea what motivated me to write this, but the idea refused to leave me alone until I wrote it all down. By posting this part now, I'll have a few chapters written already, and I have no idea how many chapters this thing will actually end up being just yet. Either way, I wanted to write a story where Jurassic World does recover from it's horrible incident, but as always, people begin to lose interest in it again after being open for a year, which leads back to the same problem that spawned the I-Rex - they need a new attraction. 
> 
> Somehow this ended up a bit more angst filled than anticipated, but I'm making sure to throw in fluffy moments too because god I love those moments! Also if you're wondering, no I'm not writing in another genetic monster to ruin everything, but I am bringing in a dinosaur that has shown up before in one of the other Jurassic movies ;) 
> 
> Another note before you guys go off into reading land, I did try to base the baby raptor names off of the phonetic alphabet as the previous girls were (except for Blue of course), and I was just gonna go from F - I for the new names to follow the girls, but…Foxtrot didn't sound appealing for a raptor name, neither did Golf or Hotel! So I went from I - L and changed the K and L names because let's face it, Kilo and Lima don't make great raptor names either. 
> 
> Just as a warning, the rating may change but I'm gonna try to keep it here at T.
> 
> OKAY, sorry for the long note, I had a lot to say about this one! I hope you guys enjoy it, I'll let you know how many chapters to expect once I get there! xoxo

     Claire had been on edge all day. She was expecting the new CEO of Masrani Global to come into her office today to discuss the future of the park. In all honesty, Claire was surprised the park had a future at all, she was even more surprised that two months after they reopened after the incident, all hotels on the island were sold out and ticket sales were through the roof. Now, almost a year after the Indominus, the park had fallen back into it’s normal routine, though everyone was a bit more cautious – especially Claire. She saw all the animals a bit differently now, the first difference being that she could no longer see them as just numbers on a spread sheet, they were living beings now all ingrained into her mind, particularly a newly hatched group of velociraptors.

 

     Four months ago, Claire had been there right by Owen’s side when four new baby velociraptors poked their way out of their eggs and into the world. She had to admit that they were fairly cute as babies, and she even held them for a little while as Owen decided on names for all four of his new girls, and even asked Claire for a bit of help in naming them. Of course, in order to regain control of the park, all the dinosaurs had to be returned to their proper paddocks, and Blue was the last of them to have been captured, but she had made it. With India, Juliette, Kyla, and Lori to take care of now, Owen had a full plate, on top of looking out for Blue, and some days Claire swore he was busier than her anymore. Every night though, she made her way into their bed in his bungalow and curled up beside him, falling asleep to the steady sound of his breathing unless they had other plans in mind. And right now, more than any place in the entire world, Claire wanted to be in that bed beside Owen instead of trapped in her office as if it were a cage, waiting for some word that Lydia Carson was on her way.

 

     A little ding chirped from her phone and Claire had hoped it would be Owen, letting her know he was still alive after she hadn’t heard from him all day. Instead it was Zach, who seemed to have formed a routine in the past six months, of texting Claire at least once a day _everyday;_ and he always started with asking the same thing.

 

     ‘ _hey aunt claire, when can we visit again?’_

 

     She kept putting him off with promises of talking to Karen about it and rearranging her schedule since she was so busy with the park getting back on its feet. Claire knew it was only a matter of time though before those little white lies would catch up with her and both Zach and Gray would find a way to get here to her, if they were determined enough – which she knew they were.

 

     “Ms. Dearing?” Her new assistant, Emma, was a polar opposite of how Zara used to be. Emma was quite and cautious; Claire often found herself mentally comparing Emma to a newborn deer, all big brown eyes, taller than Claire and as big around as a twig, and startled at the most sudden of noises.

 

     “Go ahead, Emma.” Claire sighed and put her cell phone down without a response, she’d get back to Zach later at some point.

 

     “Uh, Ms. Carson’s assistant just called, she said that Ms. Carson won’t be in today. She’s showing potential sponsors for a new attraction around the island.” Emma chewed on her bottom lip, nervously awaiting Claire’s reaction.

 

     “Now she decides to call,” Claire grumbled. “No one cares to tell me anything in this place anymore.”

 

     “If you want, you can go Ms. Dearing. I know you want to leave, I can handle things here.” Emma said as she tucked a stray piece of her blonde hair behind her ear.

 

    Claire knew there was no other reason for her to stay today; things had been slowing down at the park, and as much as it bothered her that she had no idea what this _new attraction_ was that Lydia Carson could be showing to sponsors, Claire had better things to do with her time now – like checking to see if Owen was still upright and breathing.

 

     “Okay. Call me if there is any emergencies, and if Ms. Carson calls for me, give her my cell phone number.” Claire rose from her seat and grabbed her phone and purse, she remembered when she would trap herself in this office from dawn until dusk; ever since the incident however, Claire saw things differently and realized there were plenty of other places she would rather be spending her time.

 

     “Enjoy the rest of your day!” Emma called out to her as Claire left the office.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     There were only two places on the entire island that Claire knew she would find Owen at during the day. Her first stop the was paddock for the babies, it wasn’t far from where the old paddock had been for the girls, though it was drastically different from the one that once belonged to Blue and her sisters. This time, Jurassic World owned the raptors in that pen, and their home was built to be an attraction, at least for when they were grown and trained. Claire still remembered the day she told Owen that these raptors would have to be part of the park, the deal had been either they make a new pack of raptors for the masses, or Blue would be put on full display. She knew how much Blue had meant to Owen, and she fought tooth and nail to keep Blue out of it, these new baby raptors were the price of saving Blue.

 

     _“You can’t just turn them into damn circus animals! They’re animals, **dinosaurs**! They are not something that can be controlled, when will you understand that?”_ It had been their first real fight and Claire still felt the sting of it every time she came out here. It had taken her a while to calm Owen down and tell him it was either the babies or Blue and she did what she had to in order to protect the raptor he still loved so much. As it was, the chairmen of the company often reminded Claire how generous they were being in letting Blue remain alive and in her paddock that was earning them nothing.

 

     The entire mood of this paddock was drastically different from the old paddock, not only was everything shiny and new, walkways in place for future park guests that led up into the paddock which resembled more of an observatory on the inside than anything else. There were still the catwalks that stretched out over the top of the paddock that no guest would ever be able to get to thankfully, but even the people there were different. Before most of the employees who had worked with Owen and Barry were all part of InGen as well, they did have a few interns from the park, but they were few and far between; now everyone was a Jurassic World employee and cared about the velociraptors being happy and healthy as opposed to thinking they’d become weapons someday. As much as Owen had wanted to hate the thought of these new raptors becoming an act, he had mentioned multiple times how he liked the new people he’d been working with – people who cared like him and Barry.

 

     As Claire got out of her car, she wasn’t surprised to have almost immediately been spotted one of Owen’s interns – Trevor. Trevor was at best only a few years older than Zach but had Gray’s fascination with dinosaurs, particularly the velociraptors. Claire often teased Owen that he had a shadow now, and it didn’t help that Trevor resembled Owen a bit; Owen would occasionally grumble about how Trevor better not get any ideas about developing a crush on Claire. She hated to admit it sometimes, but Owen’s jealousy was adorable, especially when he thought a nineteen-year-old boy had a chance of stealing her away.

 

     “Hey, Ms. Dearing!” Trevor called out to her from the top of the catwalk. “Are you looking for Owen?”

 

     “Is he here?” Claire asked.

 

     “He just left a few minutes ago, I don’t know where he went but…he was pretty pissed off after Barry talked to him. Tore out of here on his bike like a bat out of hell!” Trevor exclaimed.

 

     _Shit_ , Claire thought. There was only one thing that could tick Owen off, and there was only one place where he would go.

 

     “I’ll find him.” Claire sighed.

 

     “When you do, could you tell him that India is acting weird? She won’t eat anything and she won’t let her sisters eat either.” Trevor explained.

 

     “I will.” Claire responded, though she knew more bad news would probably be the last thing Owen would want to hear right now.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     Claire knew she had pulled up to Blue’s paddock just in time as soon as she saw Owen outside of it, yelling at one of the ACU guys and looking as if he were about to strangle him with his bare hands.

 

     “Do you have _any_ idea how long it will take for her to trust me again because you have a couple of trigger happy idiots working for you!” Owen was shouting at the man in front of him, though the man never flinched an inch.

 

     “She was trying to escape.” The man stated calmly.

 

     “Of course she was! She always has tried to escape, that’s why I’m here in the first place!” Owen was five seconds away from decking the guy square in the jaw.

 

     “Owen!” Claire shouted as soon as she got out of her car and ran towards him. “Owen, what’s wrong?”

 

     “Blue tried to get out and before Barry could even come and get me they shocked her and hit her with enough tranquilizers to keep her knocked out until tomorrow morning!” Owen was still riled up, and the chances of him hitting the ACU guy were still pretty high.

 

     “She’s been out of her cage before, if she found a way out she would put the park at risk. You said it yourself that she doesn’t trust you fully yet, she wouldn’t listen to you like last time.” The man said.

 

     It was the final straw for Owen and before Claire could even react, Owen’s fist made direct contact with the man’s jaw and sent him tumbling back a few steps.

 

     “Okay, come on Owen.” Claire took his free arm and tried to pull him away. He stood his ground for a moment, having a silent stare down with the guy from ACU, but he finally relented and followed Claire into the safety cage where she could see a glimpse of Blue lying passed out on the ground inside the paddock. “Are you alright?”

 

     “I’m fine.” Owen sighed as Claire took his hand; she knew he hit him pretty good since his knuckles were already turning a bit red.

 

     “Blue tried to get out?” Claire asked.

 

     “Third time this month, only every other time it was at night and usually either me or Barry was here with her and able to stop her.” Owen was relaxing a bit now, that much Claire could tell, but as he heard the other ACU members climb down from the catwalk, Claire could still see him bristle at their presence. “They just set me back three months with her or more.”

 

     “Hey, it’ll be alright.” Claire reassured him, she had set a rule between them of no kissing at work, but she had been tempted in times like this to break those very rules.

 

     “Yeah.” Owen mumbled. He gave Claire a quick kiss on the forehead, something she couldn’t really argue, before he walked over to the gate and watched Blue sleep.

 

     Everything was still the same about Blue’s paddock, including the four harnesses that once held her and her sisters whenever Owen and Barry put them in there. Now they served as nothing but a haunting reminder of what had happened, and just how lonely Blue was in the world now.

 

     “I know you’ve had your share of bad news for the day, but Trevor told me the girls were acting funny, India isn’t eating or letting the others eat.” Claire walked up beside him and watched Blue.

 

     “They’re going to drive me nuts,” Owen gave a slight laugh, “that’s their new thing, they only eat if I’m there.”

 

     “You’re their alpha after all, makes sense.” Claire gave a smirk while Owen laughed even more.

 

     “India is their beta and she’s just like Blue. She likes to try and climb all over me to get my attention, do you know that this morning she tried to bite my ear to get my attention?” Owen smirked.

 

     “She sounds like a little kid trying to get daddy’s attention.” Claire remarked.

 

     “I wish she’d try with less teeth.” Owen said. “So, my day’s going spectacularly, how about yours?”

 

     “I just want to go home and go to bed.” Claire sighed. “I spent all day waiting for that Lydia Carson to show up and she just had her assistant call a little while ago saying that she wasn’t going to be coming in today. Worst part is she mentioned something about showing sponsors around for a new attraction.”

 

     “New attraction? You didn’t tell me you guys were working on a new attraction.” Owen looked down at her curiously now.

 

     “Apparently no one decided to tell me that either. If you’re alright here, I’m thinking about paying a visit to the lab.” Claire said.

 

     “Go ahead, I’m fine. I’ll go get the girls to eat and have Barry check on Blue. I’ll see you tonight, right?” Owen asked.

 

     “Of course.” Claire grinned and gave Owen a peck on the lips.

 

     “Hey, what was that about the no kissing rule again?” Owen asked with a smirk.

 

     “Well, no one is really around so, it’s fine.” Claire shrugged.

 

     “I knew this day would come, I’ve turned you into a rule breaker.” Owen sighed. “It was only a matter of time I guess, not much longer now until you’re breaking every single rule you can find.”

 

     Claire rolled her eyes while Owen got a good laugh out of it. Claire’s phone started ringing and she had a dreadful feeling that it was either Emma calling with an emergency, or Lydia herself. Instead she saw a picture of Zach lighting up her phone, one she’d taken during her visit to Wisconsin a few months ago to check on the boys.

 

     “Wow, from texting everyday to phone calls, if he wasn’t your nephew I’d be a bit suspicious.” Owen grinned though his smile faltered when he saw how worried Claire looked. “What’s wrong?”

 

     “I’ll tell you later.” Claire sighed as she gave Owen a kiss on the cheek before answering the phone and walking away.


	2. Classified

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I don’t trust classified anymore, and after what Dr. Wu did, I can’t believe they made you no better than him.” Claire hissed out. If there was one thing that Claire had picked up during the year of being with Owen, it was that somehow she had gotten angrier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Thank you guys for the wonderful comments and kudos, I appreciate every single one! Hopefully in this chapter things start to get a bit more interesting, more of the story is brought in and of course I tried to throw in more Clawen (especially at the end ;]). I hope you guys are liking the story so far, I'm having so much fun writing it, also I'm still not sure how many chapters this will be in total, but it's looking like it might be a pretty long one! I'll try to get the chapters up as frequently as I can! xoxo
> 
> P.S. Sorry this chapter is super long, I think it's a little over 3,000 words, I get into a lot of detail when I really like what I'm writing, hopefully it's not too much to the point of making it boring! I just really love getting into detail about all these characters that I love so much, it's a problem.

     “Zach, is everything okay?” Claire answered as soon as she got into her car. She could see Owen still watching her from the raptor cage as she pulled away.

 

     “Yeah, everything’s fine Aunt Claire.” Zach sounded normal to her surprise, or at least normal for him, as if he was talking to her but his mind was somewhere else. “You never answered back earlier, I thought something was wrong with you, or whatever.”

 

     “I’m fine, everything is fine.” Claire reassured him.

 

     “Cool, good.” Zach stated. There was a pause for a moment, Claire considered prying, but Zach broke the silence himself. “So, when can Gray and I visit you again?”

 

     Claire hesitated; she’d been putting off answering that question for a while, mostly because she didn’t know how to answer it. She missed Zach and Gray; she missed them like crazy if she was being perfectly honest with herself. They had all bonded on that fateful day, and checked in just about everyday with one another, she knew that the boys would even text Owen sometimes to see how her “badass boyfriend” was doing.

 

     “I’m not sure, things are getting crazy around here again.” Claire sighed, it wasn’t exactly a lie, and the day had been full of excitement.

 

     “Whatever.” She could tell Zach didn’t buy it. “If you don’t want us there just say it.”

 

     “No, it’s not that Zach, I miss you, Gray, your mom; I miss all of you guys. Just…let me talk to your mom later on, I have something I have to handle here.” Claire said.

 

     “Alright,” Zach said, she knew he _still_ didn’t believe her. “Bye.”

 

     “Zach, I –“

 

     She already heard that the line went dead before she could finish her sentence. Claire spent the rest of her drive over to the lab thinking about what exactly she was planning on saying to her sister later that night, if this hellish day would ever end.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     Owen remembered exactly how his girls used to be when they were babies; they were rambunctious and could give a human toddler a run for their money in the troublemaking department. Yet, somehow, this new group of raptors he’d been given seemed ten times more rowdy than the last. India was the beta and a climber, she jumped halfway up Owen every time he entered the cage and wrapped herself around the back of his neck, waiting for him to notice her. Juliette, the second oldest, liked to wrap herself around Owen’s legs and cry up to him until he paid attention to her, Kyla, the third one, followed Juliette’s lead. Lori was the baby of the bunch and she would always jump up into Owen’s arms when he least expected it, which either ended with him catching her or Lori sinking her tiny talons into his chest until he got ahold of her. While these girls had certainly been more affectionate than Blue and her sisters, they were more of a handful, and were unfortunately learning quickly just how to get their way.

 

     “Ah, come on Indi, not right now.” Owen grumbled as India climbed her way up his back. She had ruined more shirts and vests of his than he could count this way.

 

     She wrapped herself around his neck, claiming her spot, and her sisters shortly followed and the whining for attention began.

 

     “Man, they really love you already!” Trevor called out from the catwalk above.

 

     “Yeah, you got the food?” Owen asked, Trevor held out the bucket of dead rats for him to see. “Go ahead and throw them down.”

 

     As soon as one of the rats hit the ground, all the girls stopped their cries and focused on the food. India climbed her way down and all stood perfectly still, sniffing the air. It took them a moment before they turned back up to Owen and cried, almost asking his permission in a way if it was okay to eat now. He’d been training them by whistling and clicks, the same way he trained Blue and her sisters, and with one quick whistle, all four of them went racing for the rat until Trevor dropped down more. Owen took their feeding time as a chance to slip away, and before any of them could notice, he was back out of the pen and watching them devour their dinner.

 

     “I think India will have to learn the same way Blue had to learn about not climbing on you, unless you want a fully grown velociraptor on your shoulder soon.” Barry called out with a smirk from the gate not too far from where Owen stood. He had been in the paddock a few times, but not nearly as often as Owen, seeing that the park had insisted that Owen was to be the one who showed them off to the world when they were ready.

 

     “I’ll have to start that soon, that and the eating without me in here trick should be a fun one to teach them.” Owen made his way out of the security pen and made sure the door locked behind him. The more rats Trevor threw down to the girls, the less they seemed to care about Owen being missing.

 

     “Before you know it we’ll have them tracking pigs, just like Blue.” Barry’s voice was a bit quieter now, his smile fading from his face. Owen wasn’t the only one who had missed the girls, and with all the new people around them, he sometimes forgot that Barry had been a part of it all once too.

 

     “Might have to wait a bit with these girls, they’re more…active than Blue was with her sisters. We’ll have to find a way to hold their attention for longer than a few seconds first.” Owen stated. “How’s Blue?”

 

     “Still asleep, ACU left for the day and I have some of the interns watching her for now, I’ll stay with her tonight in case she wakes up before morning.” Barry said while stifling a yawn.

 

     “I can watch her tonight.” Owen offered.

 

     “No, you’ve done enough for the day.” Barry laughed. “I saw what you did to that one man from ACU, plus with these girls getting smarter everyday. I can handle Blue, you need sleep more than I, my friend.”

 

     Owen grinned and watched as the girls finally realized he was gone once the food had stopped, he walked away, Barry falling into step beside him, in hopes that they wouldn’t start throwing a fit over him being gone.

 

     “Hey, have you heard anything about a new attraction?” Owen asked, curiously.

 

     “No, why?” Barry asked confused.

 

     “Claire said something about the new boss showing sponsors around for a new attraction today.” Owen grimaced.

 

     “With any luck it will be something small and an herbivore.” Barry teased.

 

     “Something tells me it’s going to be trouble.” Owen grumbled.

 

     “For everyone’s sake, let’s hope your wrong.” Barry answered.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     The Creation Center was always full of people, much to Claire’s surprise. When the park was first opening, she thought people would spend more time around the actual dinosaurs rather than learning about them here, but no matter the time of day, the building was always full. In particular, people would always crowd around the lab windows, watching the baby dinosaurs come into the world right in front of them. She still remembered the day that Owen’s new raptors hatched, she was there and so were as many other people that could crowd around the glass, seeing the new raptors that wouldn’t be seen again until they were fully trained. Today, Claire could see through the masses of people that there was a new triceratops hatching, they had lost countless dinosaurs to the Indominus, mostly herbivores, and as the babies who were once part of the petting zoo grew older to replace those lost in the valley, they had to replace those babies.

 

     Claire got in through one of the back entrances to the lab, and though there were the crowds at the glass, the scientists persisted on as if there was no one there. With Dr. Wu gone and no one at the park having heard a word from him since the incident, he was ultimately replaced by one of the other scientists that had worked in the lab for a while. Dr. Maura Byrne had been the most senior scientist behind Dr. Wu, and before the park even re-opened, she had been fully promoted to be the head of the lab. Dr. Byrne had usually sent every little detail of what was going on in the lab up to Claire, something she found to be a bit tedious at first seeing as Dr. Wu had put everything together in singular reports at the end of the week. Then again, after seeing what Dr. Wu had hidden from everyone, she began to appreciate Maura’s transparency, but apparently she was no longer as honest as she used to be.

 

     “Dr. Byrne?” Claire called out.

 

     Dr. Byrne noticed Claire, and the smile on her face from holding the baby triceratops faded as soon as she saw her. She handed the dinosaur off to one of the others by the hatching area, wiped her hands off onto her lab coat, and walked towards Claire, trying to keep as blank of an expression as she possibly could.

 

     “Ms. Dearing, I wasn’t told that you would be visiting the lab today. Did you come to see the triceratops?” She asked curiously.

 

     “No, I came here to see the new attraction.” Claire stated, she could hear the familiar ice in her voice, the coldness she had saved for when she wanted things done now instead of directing it at every person in her path.

 

     “I believe you’re mistaken, Ms. Dearing. There is no new attraction.” Maura tried to smile and give a chuckle of disbelief, but Claire could see as plain as day that she was lying through her teeth.

 

     “Ms. Carson has been showing potential sponsors around the park all day, sponsors don’t show up unless there is a new attraction being planned.” Claire snapped. She watched Maura closely as her eyes shifted to something behind Claire, once she turned around she saw another hatching nest, filled with four eggs. Beside it was another nest with only two rather large eggs in it. “Are these it?”

 

     “Both are, uh, classified.” Maura cleared her throat and walked ahead of Claire to the nests.

 

     “Those look like raptor eggs.” Claire pointed towards the smaller four eggs. “Why are you making more raptors?”

 

     “Classified.” Maura stated, this time trying to summon a bit more authority, as she stood up a bit straighter and stared Claire down. “Ms. Carson told me that she would be explaining all of this to you tomorrow, until then, all of this is to remain classified to all but me.”

 

     “I don’t trust _classified_ anymore, and after what Dr. Wu did, I can’t believe they made you no better than him.” Claire hissed out. If there was one thing that Claire had picked up during the year of being with Owen, it was that somehow she had gotten angrier.

 

     Claire had turned her attention towards the two larger eggs now – they strangely resembled the size of what the Indominus’ egg used to be.

 

     “Can you at _least_ tell me if this is another genetic monster?” Claire persisted.

 

     “It’s one dinosaur, singular. The only thing done to it and its sibling is what we do to every other dinosaur here in the park; we filled in their gaps. They’re not combined with anything else.” Maura assured her, unfazed by Claire’s anger.

 

     “I hope for our sakes that it’s something we can keep an eye on this time.” Claire mumbled. “I’ll be back tomorrow when I find out what’s in those damn eggs.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

     Owen had made it home before the sun had set by some miracle. The girls were curling up on top of one another when he left, and according to Barry, Blue was still sound asleep and probably would be well through the night. He wanted to see first thing tomorrow morning if he could get different ACU guys on Blue’s watch instead of the idiots they had placed out there, so ready to pull the trigger if the breeze blew the wrong way. But right now, what he wanted more than anything was to stretch out on his couch with a cold beer and preferably with Claire right beside him. He hadn’t heard a word from her since she left Blue’s paddock, and he could only imagine what she must have found down at the lab. As long as it wasn’t another Indominus, Owen was sure they could handle whatever they decided to cook up this time, as long as they had someone with it to raise it right instead of in isolation.

 

     With his beer in hand right out of the fridge, Owen plopped down on the couch and turned on the TV, mostly for background noise as there weren’t very many channels one could get this far out on the island. Claire hadn’t officially moved it, things of hers would just start showing up here and there around the bungalow until he was sure more than half of her stuff was here. And despite her constantly picking up after the both of them, the past two hectic days resulted in a few things being out of place that Owen knew would drive Claire nuts. He had always let his shoes lay around the house, when he lived by himself it usually resulted in him almost tripping over them on his early mornings, though he never moved them. He knew the past few nights Claire had been coming in beyond exhausted, since she only left her high heels scattered about too when she was too tired to care.

 

     Owen got up off the couch and tried to tidy up a bit, dragging their shoes back into the bedroom; even picking up the stray pieces of clothing that could have only come from a couple of nights ago since every other night this week they’ve been lucky to make it to their bed to pass out. Claire had brought over other things aside from her clothes and shoes; she had some make-up scattered about in the bathroom, her flatiron (or at least the _good one_ according to Claire), her laptop had found a permanent home on the dresser, and somehow even some of her books had ended up on his shelves. Any other person would have said that yes, Claire Dearing lived with him, but despite everything they went through, nothing had been said out loud truly or set in stone. Owen would have been lying if he said it didn’t bother him at least a little bit, but he knew Claire, and he knew that when she was ready, she would move the last of her stuff over. After Owen had picked up some of the stuff around the house, he heard Claire making her way in the door and apparently, making a beeline right for the fridge from the sounds of it.

 

     He walked into the kitchen and found her digging around in there for something, he was surprised when she pulled out a bottle of beer and opened it up without a second of hesitation before taking a long sip from it.

 

     “I take it your day didn’t get any better after you left the cage, huh?” Owen asked. Claire just shrugged and took another sip of her beer. “You’re drinking beer Claire, you only grab that when you don’t feel like dealing with the wine bottle which means your day kinda sucked.”

 

     “Everything is classified down there again, except for the new babies for the petting zoo.” Claire grumbled. “They’ve got something big, and I think they’re making more raptors too, at least that’s what it looked like.”

 

     “It’s probably something else, they’ve got enough trouble with the girls, I doubt they’d go ahead and make more of them.” Owen said, or at least he hoped he was right since four velociraptor babies were his limit.

 

     “…Yeah, you’re probably right.” Claire let out a long sigh, her shoulders finally relaxed a bit as she took another hit off of her beer.

 

     Owen grabbed his drink off the table before joining Claire in the kitchen, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her close. She wanted to resist for a moment, but she gave in and melted into his arms, actually letting herself lean on him a bit – he knew then that she was truly drained.

 

     “There’s too many things to worry about with this place anymore. I used to be able to handle it all but now…” Claire shook her head.

 

     “Before you used to drive yourself crazy with micro-managing ever single thing that happened in this place, if an Apatosaurus sneezed, you wanted to know how many times and why.” Owen laughed, he saw Claire crack a smile and that was enough for him. “Now you just worry about more important things, like the people actually being safe in this park, and the dinosaurs being happy, you worry about Blue more than me sometimes I think and that’s saying a lot.”

 

     “I know you care about her.” Claire said, her voice just above a whisper but enough for Owen to hear.

 

     “And I’m not gonna lie, but the fact that you know that now and care about that…it’s kinda hot.” Owen grinned, pressing a kiss into her copper red hair that she had let get curly today as opposed to keeping it usually tame and straight. “You care about this place in a different way than you did before, and it’s easily gotta be the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.”

 

     “Wow, you mentioned how hot I was in two separate sentences, sounds like someone is trying for something, though I can’t imagine what in the world it possibly is that you want.” Claire had sarcasm just dripping from her voice, but had a grin plastered on her face and Owen couldn’t help himself when he leaned in and started pressing kisses up and down her neck.

 

     “You know,” Owen mumbled against her skin, “I can think of a couple of things that might help out with all this stress we’ve got built up.”

 

     “I’m sure you can.” Claire laughed as she turned around in Owen’s arms to face him, though he never stopped kissing her neck for a second.

 

     It wasn’t long before Claire captured Owen’s lips and she used it as a distraction to start trying to unbutton his shirt.

 

     “And I thought I was the eager one tonight.” Owen laughed as he pulled away from Claire long enough to help her with his shirt before pulling her own over her head.

 

     “How about we move this to the bedroom?” Claire offered with a sly smile.

 

     “You read my mind.” Owen grinned.

 

     He scooped Claire up who let out a surprised squeal before wrapping her arms around Owen’s neck and distracting him even further with more kisses.


	3. A Twist in the Tail

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hey guys! I'm trying not to keep you all waiting too long for these chapters, I know how much the waiting sucks so I'll get the chapters out as quick as I can! I think this chapter went a bit slow, most of these beginning chapters are for setting up the story, but MWAHAHA I left you with a cliffhanger, kinda. I hope you guys enjoy this chapter! xoxo P.S. I'm just making up birthdays here, I have no idea when any characters actual birthday is.

     One of the things that Claire used to absolutely hate was cuddling, especially after sex. It just so happened to also be one of the things that Claire discovered Owen _loved_ to do – especially after sex. It had taken her a while to get used to him wrapping his arms around her and their limbs getting intertwined with one another in the beginning. But before she had started bringing her stuff over piece by piece, when she still spent nights away from him in her apartment on the island, she began to find herself missing Owen holding her. After a while, Claire began to seek out the cuddling herself, as she had tonight by wrapping herself comfortably around Owen, his hand resting perfectly on her waist and holding her close to his side.

 

      “Comfy?” Owen asked with a chuckle.

 

     “You have no idea.” Claire smirked.

 

     The comfort, unfortunately, didn’t last as long as Claire had hoped, since even from all the way in the bedroom, Claire could hear her cell phone ringing from where she left it on the kitchen counter.

 

     “It can go to voicemail, right?” Owen asked hopefully.

 

     Soon, Owen’s cell phone started ringing too, somewhere still left in the pocket of his pants thrown aside on the floor.

 

     “Something tells me that it can’t.” Claire grumbled as she got out of bed, threw on one of Owen’s shirts she had folded on top of the nearby dresser, and made her way into the kitchen.

 

     She was expecting it to be Lydia, or worse, the control room calling with an escape problem – it was more likely after all since both hers and Owen’s phones rang at the same time. The first time she had gotten a call from Lowery in the control room since the island re-opened was about an escape, it was only about the pachycephalosaurus roaming out of his zone as he always had, but it was still enough to fling Claire into a fully induced panic that Owen had to calm her down from. Claire never had panic attacks before the Indominus, but now every time her phone rang, she held her breath a bit until she saw who it was calling. It was more than a relief to see Karen was calling her.

 

     “Hey, everything alright?” Claire asked right away.

 

     “Hey, yeah, everything’s fine.” Karen replied, she sounded calm thankfully. “I know it’s late, but I’ve had the boys asking me all day when you were going to call and, well, you know how they are now.”

 

     _“Hi Aunt Claire!”_ She could hear Gray yelling in the background.

 

     “Oh, _crap_ , that’s my fault, I told Zach I’d call you later.” Claire sighed. “Sorry, I got distracted.”

 

     “I’m guessing that distraction involved a certain raptor trainer, so you’re forgiven.” Karen laughed.

 

     “Karen!” Claire hissed.

 

     “I don’t blame you, I’d probably get distracted by that too-“

 

     “ _Karen!_ ” Claire could feel her cheeks turning three shades of red from embarrassment, thank god Owen was still in the bedroom or she knew he’d never let her live it down.

 

     “Alright, alright.” Karen giggled now. “I’m done, I promise. I am curious though, why has Zach been telling me to call you for the past hour?”

 

     “He asked me again when I would let him and Gray come and visit me out here on the island, I told him I would talk to you about it later.” Claire had this discussion with Karen a few other times over the past year, both had agreed at the time that it was best for the boys to stay away from the island. Over the past few months however, both had been determined to get back to the island, especially Zach.

 

     “Oh,” Karen said, though Claire noticed she didn’t sound surprised, “I see.”

 

     “I didn’t promise them anything about actually coming back.” Claire reassured her.

 

     “No, I…I’ve just been thinking about it. Maybe it wouldn’t be a horrible idea.” Karen sighed.

 

      “What are you saying?” Claire asked.

 

     “I’m saying, when we first got home after all of that, the boys acted the way I expected. Gray took down nearly all the dinosaur stuff in his room; they both had more nightmares than I could count. I think the first three months back home they spent more time up late watching movies in the living room than actually sleeping.” She explained, Claire had heard all the stories, she knew the Indominus haunted her nephews just as much, if not more, than it haunted her and Owen.

 

     “I know.” Claire mumbled.

 

     “But…recently, now that it’s just us three, they’ve been different. Gray has all his dinosaur stuff back out, I think he even has more if possible. Him and Zach have been getting along, which is great, but when they’re not busy playing mindless shooter games, they’re talking about dinosaurs. Zach couldn’t even name the other dinosaurs outside of the velociraptors, T-Rex, and that other…thing. Now he talks to Gray about the mosasaurus and the armor on an ankylosaurus. I don’t know if it’s something they’re doing just to get back to you and the island, but I don’t know what to make of it. They still have nightmares sometimes, but they just brush it off like it was nothing.” Concern finally filled Karen’s voice, and Claire knew she had every right to worry.

 

     “Do you want them to come back?” Claire asked, she couldn’t figure out why she found some part of her wishing for the boys to return, other then the fact of that she actually missed them despite seeing them not too long ago.

 

     “Alone? Not in a million years. Don’t get me wrong, I couldn’t be more thankful for everything you and Owen did when all of that happened, but…I just don’t want to let them out of my sights again, not to go there.” Karen clarified.

 

     “Why don’t you come here with them then?” Claire offered before she even fully thought through what she had just asked.

 

     “I don’t know.” Karen hesitated.

 

     “I just…I don’t know if it will be the same for the boys as it was for me but, I didn’t want to come back at first. I had nightmares every time I closed my eyes, if Owen hadn’t been there with me after everything was said and done, I don’t know what would have happened. I waited for as long as I could to come back here, and it was scary when I set foot on the island again. Everything was captured and locked up but I still didn’t feel safe, I don’t think anyone on this island will ever really feel safe again. But maybe they have to face their fears, like everyone who came back did.” Claire explained.

 

     Claire still remembered the first dinosaur she went to see once everything was back on track; Owen was busy trying to keep Blue calm, and Claire went all by herself into the T-Rex paddock, standing where so many park guests had stood before to watch her eat. She couldn’t move for the first ten minutes when she saw the T-Rex again, but she got through it slowly, on her own, and everyday after that she’s tried to remind herself that the Indominus did not defeat her. Claire was still alive and breathing, even after coming face to face with honest to god monsters, and she knew that if it hadn’t been for the T-Rex, she probably wouldn’t be standing there to watch her through the glass.

 

     “Do you really think it would help them?” Karen was almost whispering now, Claire figured the boys must have been trying to listen in wherever she was.

 

     “I don’t know, I really don’t.” Claire stated. “But I know it’s worth a shot, I’ll bring all three of you out here, whenever you want. I miss you guys.”

 

     “I miss you too.” Karen said. “Alright, well…it’s a little late for Christmas break, maybe in the summer? The boys get out of school in June, Gray’s birthday is later on that month.”

 

     “I could bring you guys out then, when’s Gray’s birthday?” Claire asked.

 

     “June 29th, he’ll be thirteen, god I feel so old.” Karen said and Claire couldn’t help but laugh. “Hey, don’t laugh, you’ll know what I mean when you have kids.”

 

     “If I do.” Claire corrected her.

 

     “Whenever you do, you’ll know what I mean.” Karen retorted.

 

     “Okay, well, I’ll have to plan it more later on tomorrow but, I’ll try and get you guys out here a few days before that. And this time you will all actually get to stay out here for a week, maybe a bit longer if you want, but we can all celebrate his birthday together.” Claire couldn’t quite describe what she was feeling right now. Excited? Happy? Hopeful? Something in-between all of that.

 

     “Sounds good to me.” Karen said. “I’ll let the boys know.”

 

     “Tell them that I love them, okay?” Claire asked.

 

     “I will. Tell Owen not to distract you too much.” Karen laughed.

 

     “Bye Karen.” Claire huffed.

 

     “Bye.” Her sister was still giggling when she ended the call.

 

     Claire kept her phone with her as she tiptoed back into the bedroom and saw Owen sitting up in bed, sheets pulled into his lap, and still holding his cell phone though he was staring at it as if it were a possessed object.

 

     “What’s wrong?” Claire asked as she sat down beside him on the bed.

 

     “I’m not sure. Lydia Carson called me.” Owen murmured.

 

     “What?” Claire asked in disbelief.

 

     “She said to go into the office with you tomorrow morning, she wants to talk to both of us.” Owen said.

 

     “I don’t like the sound of that.” Claire grumbled.

 

     “Whatever it is, at least I’ll have you there with me.” Owen gave her a small smile now before he gently intertwined his fingers with hers and kissed her on the cheek.

 

     “Of course, I seem to remember someone telling me we had to stick together after all, for survival.” Claire grinned.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     Owen never really liked the offices of Jurassic World.

 

     He always felt that everything in there was far too cold, all it’s sharp edges and modern everything. Sure, half the park was controlled by modern technology, but it all seemed to be far too concentrated in the offices, especially in Claire’s part of the building. Owen knew that this was where she felt comfortable, or at least where she had felt comfortable; he still remembered the first few days she stayed in the bungalow and how it took her a while to get used to the bugs out there. But everything in here had always felt constricting to Owen, and it always made him want to spend as little time as he could in the building; it didn’t help that he was called into a meeting with Lydia Carson either. Owen was however greatly relived when he walked into Claire’s office and only found her there, sitting at her desk, messing around with something on her phone. 

 

     “Are you finally messing around with one of the games I put on that thing for you?” Owen asked with a sly grin, he’d been slowly sneaking games onto Claire’s phone over the past couple of months – everything from Angry Birds to Candy Crush, and as far as he knew, she hadn’t touched any of them yet.

 

     “No, I’ve been trying to figure out what’s in those eggs, I’ve had Lowery looking into it all morning, and so far he’s got nothing.” Claire sighed.

 

     “Well, there’s no point in worrying about it now. Isn’t she supposed to be here by now?” Owen asked as he pulled up one of the chairs in the room to sit in front of the desk.

 

     “Yes, and she’s late.” Claire huffed, tossing her phone aside.

 

    “Hey, at least I’m not the late one this time.” Owen smirked.

 

     “No, you’re still late, she’s just even later than you are.” Claire explained. “How’s Blue?”

 

     “Upright and breathing, no thanks to ACU.” Owen grumbled. “You said something about the boys coming here again, did you get that all figured out?”

 

     “With how late she’s running, I could have planned two separate trips for them,” Claire complained. “But, yes, I did. Karen’s coming with them this time, they’re coming in June for Gray’s birthday.”

 

     “Do you remember how hold he’s gonna be?” Owen asked with a smirk.

 

     “ _Yes_ ,” Claire knew Owen was never going to let her forget about that, “He just turned twelve this past June so when I see him he’ll be turning thirteen.”

 

     “Damn, he’s getting old.” Owen grinned, but when he noticed how Claire wasn’t even paying attention and just glaring at her computer, he knew something else was bothering her.  “What’s wrong?”

 

     “I’m worried about the boys, Karen told me how they were doing, dealing with everything that happened.” Claire sighed.

 

     “Nightmares?” Owen assumed it would have been that, he had his fair share of them after the Indominus, most of them involving him losing Claire.

 

     “No, it’s like…it’s like they’re pretending it never happened or something. She said Gray put all his dinosaur stuff back up, apparently dinosaurs are almost all they talk about anymore, it doesn’t make sense.” Claire said.

 

     “Maybe they’re just tough like their Aunt.” Owen suggested.

 

     “I don’t know Owen, it just doesn’t seem…natural.” Claire was trying to fix the small stuffed velociraptor Owen had given her on the edge of her desk now, she hated how it seemed so out of place at first, but after seeing it sitting there for months, she couldn’t imagine her desk feeling complete without it.

 

     “Don’t stress yourself out about it.” Owen grabbed her hand now and for the first time since he got into the office, she actually looked right at him with those blue eyes he loved so much. “Look, when they get here, if something _really_ seems off to you about them, you are their Aunt, you can talk to them and see if there’s anything wrong. Hell, you can call them anytime you want and find out.”

 

     “I know…maybe I’ll try to Skype with them later, see if they’re excited.” Claire said, chewing on her bottom lip.

 

     “I’m sure they are.” Owen pressed a kiss to her hand before letting it go.

 

     “Ms. Dearing?” Emma had entered the room almost silently; it was enough to startle both Owen and Claire. “Sorry, but um, Ms. Carson is here.”

 

     “Go ahead and let her in, Emma.” Claire stood up from behind her desk and started straightening herself out, not that she needed too, and begrudgingly, Owen rose form his seat as well.

 

     A few moments after Emma left, Lydia walked into the room, and while Owen had never met her before, she was exactly as he expected her to be after more or less taking orders from her last night. If Claire had been completely heartless, no trace or chance of any joy or emotion – a true Ice Queen as the people around the park used to call her – she would have been Lydia Carson. She was dressed head to toe in black, as if she had just returned from someone’s funeral or was on her way to one; her golden blonde hair was pulled back which only made her angular cheekbones stand out more; she had eyes that were so icy blue they almost appeared silver, not to mention she came just about eye to eye with Owen himself. There was something else about her however; something Owen could only describe as reptilian, as if every move she made had been thoroughly calculated. She was the top dog of Masrani now, and she clearly made sure that everyone around her knew who the true alpha was.

 

     “It’s lovely to meet you again, Ms. Carson.” Claire spoke in a calm an even tone now, the faintest hint of what she must have considered an appropriate smile on her face. She came around from behind her desk and shook Lydia’s hand – from watching her Owen had a feeling that if Lydia ever smiled she would crack like stone.

 

     “You as well, Ms. Dearing.” Lydia stated before turning to Owen, as soon as her gaze landed on him, Owen hadn’t felt such an urge to be out of someone’s eyesight since the Indominus. “And you must be Mr. Grady, the raptor trainer, lovely to meet you in person.” She held out her hand to him, which Owen cautiously took and was almost surprised by not only how strong her grip was, but also how cold her hands were. Ice Queen was almost all too perfect of a name for her.

 

     “Yeah, nice to meet you.” Owen said. “Look, this seems more like a business meeting, I’m not too sure why you wanted me to be here exactly, and I’m not a business guy.”

 

     “That has been made perfectly clear Mr. Grady.” Lydia said with a forced laugh and smile that made Owen even more uncomfortable than he already was. “However, considering the nature of the discussion I knew I would be having with Ms. Dearing here today, I felt that it would only be fair for you to be present.”

 

     “Are we talking about what’s in those eggs in the lab? If you brought me here to see if I could take care of them you’re gonna have to find someone else, I’ve got five raptors already to look out for.” Owen stated.

 

     “Well, depending on how you answer my proposition, you may not need to worry about taking care of so many raptors anymore.” Lydia had a smugness about her now, as if she knew some big secret, and Owen was guessing that whatever she had to say – he would hate it.

 

     “What proposition?” Owen asked.

 

     “I want to turn Blue into an exhibit, by this summer.” Lydia said.

 

     Owen couldn’t think of a single polite word to reply with, so instead he kept himself quiet until he had a more straightforward answer.


	4. No Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So this chapter is a bit shorter than the others have been, though the next chapter is looking like it'll be another long one so hopefully that one will make up for it! Either way, I hope you guys are enjoying the story so far, this is also the chapter where we find out what those eggs were in the lab. I think I gave this hint before but they are dins that we've seen before in previous Jurassic Park movies. ;] xoxo

     “We talked about this already Ms. Carson, before the park even opened, Blue was not to be an exhibit – _ever_.” Claire spoke up; she could see Owen balling his hands into fists at his side.

 

     Claire remembered the conversation vividly, she argued perhaps more than she ever had in her life, especially over something related to the park. It used to be so simple when she didn’t care about the dinosaurs, when they were something that she could push to the back of her mind. But Blue was an animal, one she had gotten particularly attached to as a matter of fact. It was bad enough that she had to bargaining Blue’s safety with more raptors, and now it seemed as if all of that was for nothing.

 

    “I’m afraid plans have changed.” Lydia said. “The people are already losing interest in the park, despite the anniversary of the incident approaching. People come to this park now to see the T-Rex, to see the animals that survived, they even come to see you two somewhere around the park apparently. Blue is the only one from the incident that they’ve never seen and still hold an interest in, and last I checked, all she was doing was attempting escape after escape and causing headaches. If we turn her into an exhibit, something that contributes to the park, it will buy us time until Mr. Grady’s new raptors are trained and until our new attraction is open.”

 

     “No, no way, I’m not letting you turn Blue into a show pony.” Owen stated. “It’s out of the question.”

 

     “That’s not really your decision, Mr. Grady.” Lydia snapped, there was a glint of what Claire could only pick out as anger in her icy eyes. “This company _owns_ Blue, and yes, there was a time when keeping Blue away from the public was for everyone’s best interests. She was far to wild to put on display then, but now, despite all of her attempts, we feel as if she can be put in front of the public now. I did not call you here for your permission, I called you here as a courtesy, to inform you of the upcoming changes in your department.”

 

     “Four raptors being trained into circus monkeys just isn’t enough for you people? These are living, breathing animals! Blue doesn’t do well around people, you bring tourists through her home, and she’s not going to be happy about it at all. Someone is going to get hurt, weather it’s one of my guys or one of the tourists, it’s not going to end well.” Owen warned her through gritted teeth.

 

     “I noticed you put in a request for a different ACU team to watch over Blue, I’m rotating them out and giving you three extra guards, all of them being notified of your request which was to avoid shocking Blue at all costs. We want her paddock open to the public in June of next year, perhaps with a different team watching her during her attempts, you can build some trust back up with her and get her used to more people being around.” Lydia suggested as if it would all be that simple.

 

     “You can’t do this to her, she’s not an attraction, she never was.” Owen said, though Claire could tell that nothing he said would change Lydia’s mind.

 

     “The construction crews will be at Blue’s paddock tomorrow morning to being remodeling. They’ll start with the tourist walkthrough parts away from her to make the ordeal a bit less stressful.” Lydia was no longer listening to Owen’s protests and her mind was already set.

 

     “Yeah, fine.” Owen grumbled and walked out of the room; slamming the door shut behind him so hard that Claire was almost afraid the glass door would shatter – which thankfully it didn’t.

 

     There was a bit of silence between Claire and Lydia for a moment, and Claire was almost thankful for it considering she was thinking of slamming the door on Lydia as well.

 

     “Owen’s right, Blue won’t work as an attraction.” Claire sighed. “She’s still too unpredictable, if she ever got out and got to the tourists it would be nothing but more trouble for the park.” She tried to use logic, she tried to bring back the Claire Dearing she used to be who thought things like this through with numbers instead of her heart, but Claire knew how Lydia was, and she knew that nothing would change her mind.

 

     “She’ll just be a feeding exhibit, like the T-Rex; something for the people to gawk at until the appeal wears off. They’ll be building a memorial of sorts for Blue’s sisters into the attraction and it will be a good way to get people interested in velociraptors before Mr. Grady’s other raptors are ready.” Lydia stated.

 

     Claire simply nodded; there was nothing else to be said on the topic. Blue was part of Jurassic World, and deep down she knew it was only a matter of time before they tried to throw her out to the public. But Claire had bought her a year of peace, and that was more than anyone else, aside from Owen, would have tried to give her. 

 

     “Well, now that all of that is taken care of, would you care to see our new attraction, Ms. Dearing?” Lydia asked.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     It wasn’t often that Owen took the time to just sit up on the catwalks above Blue’s paddock.

 

     When he had all the girls, he would occasionally just sit up there and watch them run around, they could go for a while before noticing him up there when they were babies. As they had gotten older and gotten more used to his scent, they were able to spot him almost instantly and wouldn’t be quite until he either fed them or got down from there. Now, Blue would glance up at him, maybe call out a few times, but she would give up before wandering off around her pen again, sniffing around for something she couldn’t seem to ever find. He’d tell himself that she was just searching for the pigs that they’d still let run through there once every other day, but deep down there was something that always told him she was searching for her sisters that never came back.

 

     His phone started ringing, the sudden noise caught Blue’s attention down below for only a moment before she returned to her hunt. Owen saw Claire’s picture up on the screen, it was one of his favorites – Claire with her curly red hair shinning in the sun, finally taking an actual day off and relaxing on the beach. It was a few months after the park had re-opened and things were leveling out, Claire confessed she never actually had a day at the beach in all her years of being on the island, and Owen all but dragged her out there forcing her to take a day off knowing it would be one of his last few off days before the new raptors had hatched. But she was smiling, and her freckles had come out full force – just as she had warned him – and no matter how much Claire hated the picture for one reason or another, Owen loved it.

 

     “Sorry I just kinda left,” Owen began as he answered the phone. “I had to get out of there.”

 

     “It’s alright.” Claire answered without missing a beat. “Honestly, I wanted to storm out of there too. I’m sorry about what she’s doing, I wish I could change it.”

 

     “Hey, we tried, right?” Owen asked weakly.

 

     “Yeah.” Claire mused.

 

     “Did you find out what was in the lab?” Owen wanted to change the subject desperately, and he hoped that whatever they were cooking up in the lab would distract him from what he couldn’t change.

 

     “They’re making Spinosaurs siblings and a group of Compsognathus’” Claire sighed.

 

     “What the hell are those things?” Owen wished he could say the names sounded familiar after working on an island filled with dinosaurs for a couple of years now, but their names sounded as foreign as the Indominus had. 

 

     “Well, the Spinosaurs siblings will be living and breathing versions of the fossil they rebuilt on Main Street.” Claire sounded less than enthused, and when Owen finally realized what fossil she was talking about, he couldn’t blame her. “And the Compys are tiny little things, but they can be vicious in numbers. Think of them like tiny versions of your girls, they only get to be about a foot tall.”

 

     “God, these people haven’t learned a damn thing have they? Two giant monsters that could take on the T-Rex, and four miniature velociraptors.” Owen just shook his head in disbelief; he really wasn’t looking forward to the possible containment breech if either of those two ever found their way out like the Indominus had.

 

     “They’ve already hired someone to care for the Spinosaurs siblings when they hatch, and they’re still looking to find someone to take care of the Compys. Lydia gave me some bullshit speech about how they wanted to follow the advice you gave about the Indominus.” Claire mumbled.

 

     “If they really wanted to follow my advice, they wouldn’t have made them at all. Figures though that they choose to listen to me for that, but not about Blue.” Owen stated. “She’s not going to be happy, not with the construction workers, not with the tourists, not with anybody.”

 

     “I know.” Claire paused; Owen thought for a moment that he lost her connection, which was possible with the spotty service outside the park. “I…I tried to talk to Lydia about it more after the lab, she told me that either Blue had to go on display or they would have to put her down. She said with all the escapes she’s been attempting lately, unless Blue started making money for the park, they would want to just cut their losses and put her to sleep.”

 

     “Have I mentioned yet that I really hate the new CEO? I mean, Simon was a bit out there sometimes, but at least he cared about the animals. This one wants them all to be circus animals! Did she mention anything about visiting the Bird Cage? I know a guy over there who might be able to get a Dimorphodon to _accidentally_ attack her.” Owen often didn’t understand how people like Lydia got to be in charge of places like Jurassic World, she had about as much care for the animals as Hoskins had for the raptors; as long as the animals played into their plans, they didn’t care for what really happened to them.

 

     “She’s not worth the jail time.” Claire muttered. “You want me to come out there to you or do you want some alone time?”

 

     “You know, I think I’m alright, I’m spending some time with Blue here. I haven’t had much time with just her for a while, looks like it might be the last chance I get.” Owen glanced down at Blue now, she’d given up on her search for now and had moved on to sniffing one of the soccer balls that were left in there. She used to pop them in seconds when her sisters were around; this ball had managed to last four months, which had set a new record.

 

     “Alright, I love you.” Claire said.

 

     “I love you too.” Owen smiled as he hung up the phone.

 

     Moments after the conversation ended, Owen heard a distinct pop come from down below and he saw Blue with a popped soccer ball hanging from her claws.

 

     “So much for the record.” Owen laughed.


	5. In Memoriam

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So, funny story or well - not so funny for me at least. Somehow my computer decided to be a major ass and deleted all my files! Working on getting that fixed now and hopefully get everything back, but it unfortunately deleted the original version of this chapter that I had, yeah. So, I remembered bits and pieces, it's not exactly the same as it was supposed to be, with any luck it might be better? Either way, here's to hoping that you guys like this chapter! xoxo

     In a matter of five months, everything had managed to go completely crazy. 

 

     Owen couldn't remember the last time he had actually seen Claire, of course he still saw her just about every night, but by the time both of them had gotten home they were exhausted. One or the other was usually already in bed and asleep by the time the other came home late from work, whenever Owen came home the last thing he ever wanted to do was to disturb Claire from her well deserved sleep, but she'd almost always wake up as soon as he crawled into bed and would try to talk to him a bit before both drifted off back into unconsciousness. And over the past five months, that had been the extent of them seeing one another; they would try to text during the day when they could, and Claire had taken to leaving little handwritten notes for Owen to find every morning before he left the bungalow, but despite everything - he missed seeing Claire. He missed hearing about her day, he missed being able to just relax with her once they got home, he even missed their so called attempts at "cooking" that usually ended in disaster and a pizza. Not to mention, having to train four rambunctious velociraptors every day and worry about the one lone velociraptor escaping and devouring construction workers every night, made Owen's life a little extra stressful. 

 

     "India, come on, cut it out, eyes up here!" Owen called out as he used the clicker to try and get her attention. India's yellow eyes locked onto Owen for a moment, but as soon as Juliette had snapped at her, all focus was lost and the two started growling and snapping at one another. "Juliette! Damn it." 

 

     "At least Lori and Kyla are still paying attention." Barry laughed as he watched the raptors down below. 

 

     Sure enough, while their sisters were still battling it out, Lori and Kyla gave their undivided attention to Owen, particularly to the bucket he had in his hands that they knew was filled with treats. 

 

     "Yeah," Owen sighed, "now if only the other two would pay attention." 

 

     Owen tossed down a rat each for Lori and Kyla, India and Juliette were still too busy fighting to notice their sisters getting a treat. After they finished up their rats, they watched Owen again patiently until he let them go, they only wandered off to where their sisters were fighting and watched them in confusion. 

 

     "They'll come around. You remember how Blue and Echo were when they were their age, always fighting until Blue proved she was the beta. Once that is settled, they'll pay attention." Barry promised as he fell into step beside Owen, making their way off the catwalk. 

 

     "I hope so, the girls are supposed to be ready before those newly hatched monsters are ready for the public." Owen grumbled. 

 

     "They never learn." Barry sighed. "Either way, have you seen what they've done over at Blue's paddock?" 

 

     "I've been trying to avoid it honestly." Owen admitted with a shrug. "It's bad enough they're putting her out there on display, I really don't want to see whatever crap they're shoving inside that viewing center for people to see." 

 

     "I went in there last night, it's actually nice." Barry said. "They've got pictures of when the girls were babies, even a few videos. They've got tons of pictures of the both of us with them as they got bigger. I was watching the video they had on of when the girls were hatching and you were there with them...I didn't know Claire was there for that, I saw her in the background." 

 

     Owen smiled now, he still remembered just about everything that happened on the day he met Blue and her sisters for the first time as he watched them hatch from their eggs. He mostly remembered how badly Claire didn't want to be there, she was the senior assets manager, but he quickly learned that something about the dinosaurs - baby or not - made her very uncomfortable. There were baby ankylosaurus' hatching while they were waiting for the raptors, Owen remembered being fascinated by them, yet with every one that hatched Claire would peak over his shoulder but get no closer, and every time he noticed her looking at them, she would turn away and mess with something on her phone. When the raptors finally hatched, Claire just stood back and watched the whole thing, he remembered that at some point he somehow did get her to pet Blue a little bit; Blue and her sisters hatching were how he and Claire had met after all, and shortly after they had hatched, he managed to ask her out on their first date that was a complete disaster. 

 

     "Yeah, I remember that. I'm surprised Claire hasn't demanded the video to be taken down." Owen smirked. "She probably hasn't seen it yet." 

 

     "It's nice though, it's nice to see the girls again." Barry mused

 

     "Maybe I'll have to check it out after all." Owen sighed. 

 

* * *

 

      After the girls had their dinner and Barry had texted him letting him know that Blue was taken care of, Owen found himself feeling a bit hungry finally. He also just realized that he had gone the entire day without hearing a single word from Claire, not even so much as a text from her.  Owen knew he could have just texted her, but _god_ it had been so long since he even just heard her voice, so he had decided to call her instead and hope that she would answer. The phone rang a few times longer than it normally did, and Owen almost considered hanging up, but on the final ring Claire had finally answered. 

 

     "Hey, is everything alright?" She asked right away, she sounded frazzled, but Owen figured it was because she was busy as always. 

 

     "Everything's fine, I just wanted to hear you for a minute. I'm guessing it's a busy day?" Owen asked, he felt a bit guilty now for calling, but it was nice to hear her voice despite everything else. 

 

     "You have no idea." Claire grumbled and he heard her car door slam, either she was going somewhere or she was trying to get away from something so she could talk. "I feel weird saying this because I technically do see you every night but...I miss you." 

 

     "I miss you too." Owen couldn't help but grin and be glad that Barry was nowhere nearby to start teasing him. "I'm done for the day, before the sun sets for once. Are you still on the clock?" 

 

     "Unfortunately, yes. I've been over by the Spinosaurs siblings for the past hour, talking to the crews about the expansion since it seems like both of them are going to survive. Everyone thought that one would kill the other like the Indominus had killed her sister, but these two get along, which is actually a bigger problem than you think." Claire was stressed, Owen could hear it in her voice, they've both been stressed for the past six months really.

 

     "Well, just keep thinking about those ten days you've got off in June, an _actual_ vacation with your family." Owen tried to remind her. 

 

     "I wish we both had a vacation." Claire stated, Owen wished he had those ten days off with her too, but sadly baby raptors were a full time job, and Blue's paddock was set to open the day before Karen, Zach, & Gray arrive. 

 

     "At least we'll actually be able to see each other at the end of the day." Owen was desperately trying to stay on the positive side of things. "Are you hungry?" 

 

     "Starving, I haven't eaten anything since this morning." Claire admitted. 

 

     "Alright, well, I'm gonna go grab some dinner, are you staying over by the baby monsters?" Owen asked. 

 

     "No, I'm over on my way to Blue's paddock in a few minutes, the workers need me to sign off on something over there and Lydia wanted me to look over some new video they've just set up to play in there for the guests before the feeding starts." Claire said. 

 

     "I'll be over there in twenty minutes or so with food." Owen said. 

 

     "Bring lots of it, I could eat as much as the T-Rex right about now." Claire laughed. 

 

     "Will do." Owen said with a smile plastered on his face.

 

* * *

 

 

     He'd been trying to avoid the new visitors center now attached to Blue's paddock for quite some time now. It had been fully built two months ago, and only a month ago did they get all the monitors installed and pictures on the wall. Apparently now, they were putting the finishing touches on it, and Owen knew they were also adding on to the catwalk, installing even more safety measures everywhere they could, though they were mostly places for ACU to mount their guns when needed. Everything about the place now just reminded him of how far everything had gotten out of his control; Blue had all but been stolen form him and was being put on display for the eyes of the world. Yet, as much as Owen hated everything that was happening to Blue, so far Blue had behaved; with a new ACU captain stationed to watch over her, which thankfully involved less tasers, and Owen and Barry coming to visit her more often than they had been able to before, she hadn't attempted an escape yet. Her lack of escape attempts also worried Owen, leading him to think that she was just watching everyone, biding her time and learning the new patterns, finding a weak spot and using it to her advantage when the time is right. 

 

     Owen knew he couldn't let his mind linger on the possible what if's anymore, it would drive him into insanity if he thought of it any longer. He was here to see Claire tonight, the woman he loved who seemed more like a ghost after the past five months rather than an actual physical person he could hold in his arms. He'd brought one of Claire's favorite dinners which had actually started to grow on him a bit, sushi, and just as she had requested, he brought quite a lot of it with him. Owen stood outside the doors to the visitors center for a minute, he knew Claire was just inside, but so were the memories of the girls, and while he loved his new group of raptors - despite how they drove him crazy most times - he still missed Charlie, Delta, and Echo too. Knowing he couldn't avoid it any longer, Owen walked through the automatic doors to the building and into the visitors center. The first thing he was greeted with were monitors mounted in the wall, each one filled with pictures of the girls - everything from when they were babies to just a few days before the incident; in the middle of them all was a larger monitor, playing the video that Barry had been talking about, no sound to it however, and he watched Blue, Charlie, Delta, and Echo all hatch again as if it had just happened the other day. 

 

     "I remember that day, you know." Claire said as she walked up beside him. "I hadn't seen any of the dinosaurs up that close before then." 

 

     "I made you pet Blue." Owen smirked. 

 

     "I didn't want to, I was afraid she'd try to bite me or something." Claire protested. 

 

     "And look how far you've come since then." Owen remarked. "I brought you sushi." 

 

     "Oh thank god." Claire said with a sigh of relief and went to grab one of the bags Owen had with him, however, wanting to get a bit of fun out of everything, Owen held them up above her reach with a smile on his face. 

 

     "Not until I get a kiss from my beautiful girlfriend." He couldn't help but laugh a little bit now. 

 

     "Jerk." Claire mumbled, but she complied and stood up on her tip-toes, pulled on Owen's collar to bring him a bit more to her level, and gave him a kiss. Apparently, Claire missed Owen as much as he missed her since she even went so far as to deepen the kiss and start trying to pull Owen even further down to her. 

 

     "Whoa," Owen mumbled as soon as he broke free from Claire's lips, "whoa, there tiger. I missed you too but I don't think Blue exactly wants to see that show." Owen smirked and nodded towards the giant window that was on the opposite wall of them, the viewing glass that allowed the future visitors to watch Blue in her paddock. "Not to mention the workers are still out there." 

 

     "Someone feeling shy?" Claire asked with a grin, it was a question that left Owen speechless. "Relax Owen, I'm kidding, you should have seen your face." Claire laughed. "You're right, I don't think I exactly feel comfortable with being naked with this giant window right here." 

 

     "Good to know." Owen said. 

 

     "But, this is my last stop for the night, we can actually go home at a reasonable hour and actually have some fun, after we eat first because I wasn't kidding about the being hungry part." Claire assured him with a kiss on the cheek. 

 

     "Did you take care of the papers?" Owen asked. 

 

     "Yes, they just have to play this video in here and I have to okay it, then we can go eat." Claire sighed. 

 

     "What video?" Owen asked curiously. 

 

     "Well, since you refused to do the video for Blue, they called and asked Jimmy Fallon again." Claire explained. "There is supposed to be some screen that comes down in-between the glass here and it plays the video before the people get to see Blue." 

 

     Just as she finished explaining it, Owen noticed the lights slowly getting dimmer and he saw the screen she was talking about start to come down. 

 

     "Dinner and a movie, sounds exciting." Owen smirked as the music to the video swelled up and the park logo appeared on the screen. 

 

* * *

 

 

     Owen had suffered through the five minute long video, it felt like an eternity, but he figured at least that people would be learning just how dangerous the raptors could be and perhaps it'd keep them from trying to tap the glass like Owen knew some idiot would attempt at some point. It only took Claire a few minutes after that to sign her papers and get out of there for the day, and as soon as they got home she started eating, grateful for the fact that Owen had gotten sushi. After dinner, Owen was almost surprised that the kiss that started in the visitors center had carried on. Owen was sure he'd kissed just about every inch of Claire and was surprised he didn't actually tear any of her clothes as he took them off of her; Claire on the other hand seemed to have a little less control as she had broken off a few of the buttons that had been on Owen's shirt. They had barely made it back to the bedroom, and by the end of it all, they were completely content and their limbs were tangled up with one another. 

 

     "I can't wait until all of this chaos passes." Owen mumbled into Claire's shoulder as he left a trail of kisses before planting on final kiss on her cheek. "I missed you." 

 

     "I know, I missed you too." Claire pulled Owen closer again and gave him a kiss on the cheek as well. "Just one more month, that's all we have to survive through, one more month. After that, once my sister and the boys get here, everything should settle down. People will be going to see Blue, the Spinosaurs' and the Compys will be a little bigger and, surprisingly, a little easier - everything will be easier at least." 

 

     "Yeah, with any luck they'll be easier." Owen sighed. "One more month." 

 

     "Everything will get easier, I promise." Claire smiled. 


	6. Back To The Island

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Sorry this update took so long, I was trying to finish out planning the rest of this thing and at least I figured out how long it’s gonna be! It’s going to be ten chapters, so we’ve only got four more after this one. After this story is done I’ll still be taking Clawen prompts over on my tumblr (lannisterslioness.tumblr.com) as I have no ideas of my own at this time for anything Clawen aside from finishing this story. Here’s part six, Zach, Gray, and Karen finally show up!

     Claire had to keep reminding herself that things were different this time. There was no Indominus on the island; all the other dinosaurs were safely locked away and under a constant surveillance, and she was actually here this time. Claire had promised herself, even though Karen was with the boys, that she would not leave their side as she had the first time around; she was going to be with them and actually spend time with her nephews – if only to keep her mind from racing through all the things that could possibly go wrong with them being back on the island.

 

     “Aunt Claire!” Gray called out as soon as he spotted her right off the ferry. He ran through the crowds of people leaving his brother and mother in the dust, when he made it to her he wrapped his arms around her as tightly as he could, which had gotten significantly stronger since she last saw him.

 

     “Look at you! You got so much taller in a few months!” Claire beamed as she hugged him back; she could tell that he was going to be as tall as Zach one day, maybe even a bit taller, but he was already starting to grow like a weed.

 

     “Hey Aunt Claire!” Zach called out as soon as he spotted her, closing the gap between them as soon as he got close enough and wrapped his arms around her for a hug.

 

     “You two are getting too big too quickly.” Claire held her nephews to her as tightly as she could while she caught a glimpse of Karen just a few feet away, pulling out her cell phone and taking a picture of all of them together with a smile on her face.

 

     “Where’s Owen?” Gray asked curiously as he finally let go of Claire, Zach pulled away as well but kept one arm draped over his aunt’s shoulder.

 

     “He’s with Blue, they have those feeding shows today. He’ll be able to see you guys tonight and a little bit tomorrow, they don’t have those shows everyday thank god.” Claire was surprised when Lydia had told her and Owen; or rather let them know in an e-mail, that Blue didn’t have to be displayed everyday. Apparently she had taken the recommendations from one of the ACU officers stationed to watch over Blue whenever Owen or Barry was unable to be there, that Blue was still too wary of people to be displayed everyday.

 

     “Can we see Blue?” Gray asked, and Claire was shocked by the eager look on his face. While Blue had saved their lives, she had to admit that when she came back to the island, she wasn’t too fond of seeing any of the dinosaurs.

 

     “How about we go to the hotel first,” Karen interjected, to which Claire was relieved that she had, “we go put all our stuff down and we relax a bit. We’ve got ten days here, birthday boy.” She ruffled up Gray’s hair before pressing a kiss to the top of his head.

 

     “Sounds good to me.” Zach quickly agreed.

 

     “Yeah, okay.” Gray nodded and started walking with the flow of the rest of the crowd around them, Zach right at his side and actually paying attention to everything around him for once.

 

     “You okay?” Karen asked as she fell into step beside Claire.

 

     Claire had been talking to Karen almost every other day as their trip had gotten closer and closer. While some of the stress had been relieved once the new dinosaurs hatched and Blue’s paddock had finished it’s remodeling, things had gotten busier at the park and kept Owen and Claire on their toes. Owen had to deal with some of the people of the park now, or rather as many that could make their way out to Blue’s paddock for the feeding times, he came home late at night and just as stressed as Claire was after a day in the office.

 

     “I’m fine.” Claire sighed. “I’m better now that you guys are here.”

 

     “Hey, I’ve only been here five minutes, don’t go all soft and mushy on me already.” Karen smirked. “Save that for after we have a few drinks tonight.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

     As soon as Claire got everyone settled in their hotel suite, the boys were ready to go explore the park right away. Karen had talked them down until waiting after they went and ate lunch, which led to the boys settling with exploring the hotel downstairs a bit before they went to eat.

 

     “They’ve been like this all month,” Karen said as she plopped herself down on the sofa with a sigh, “talking about everything they want to see, all the rides they want to go on. They’ve even been talking about those new ones that you guys are advertising up on the web site already.”

 

     “Those ones won’t be ready for a while thankfully.” Claire assured her.

 

     “They’ve been talking about the raptors and the T-Rex non-stop.” Karen said. “Every chance they get they’re talking about those two.”

 

     “I just…I don’t understand it. I was terrified to come back to this place, but someone had to do it. Why did they want to come back?” Claire asked, hoping her sister would know the answer.

 

     “I have no idea. I try to talk to them about it whenever the chance presents itself; they just say the same thing every time, which is that they miss you. Don’t get me wrong, I miss you like crazy too, but I just think that whatever is going on with them is more than just missing you, Owen, and the dinosaurs.” Karen said. “Look at what they brought with them.”

 

     Karen leaned over and picked up Gray’s backpack, opening it up and pulling out a book that had an all too familiar face on the back of it.

 

     “They’re reading the book Ian Malcolm wrote?” Claire asked as she took the book from her sister, opening it up to see it was signed to Gray as well.

 

     “Yeah, they met him a few months ago, both got books signed by him. Zach drove them out there to meet him. That and the other one too, Alan Grant I think?” Karen stated. “Not to mention just the endless books on dinosaurs I’ve found in their rooms between the two of them.”

 

     “What do you think about all of this?” Claire couldn’t quite piece it all together.

 

     “Before all this happened, Gray wanted to be a paleontologist, and for a while after the island he stopped talking about it. Now all of the sudden it’s like his passion for it came back ten times stronger than it had been. Zach’s been talking about studying animal behavior, _specific_ animal behavior.” Karen said, mumbling the last bit. “I found that he was looking at applying to be an intern here on the island, I don’t know which dinosaur the internship was for.”

 

     “ _What?_ ” Claire swore she had felt her heart stop beating for just a moment, it was one thing if the boys wished to come and visit the island; she could handle the stress of letting them come to visit her if only to know she could send them back safe and sound, but the thought of either of them wanting to stay on the island was something she couldn’t quite handle. “Did he actually fill it out?”

 

     “No, not that I know of. I just found it in his room a few months ago, I asked him about it but he never gave me an answer, he just shrugged it off like he always does.” Karen groaned.

 

     “No, there is no way either of those boys are going to have anything to do with this island.” Claire assured her sister, she barely got them off the island alive once, she would be damned if something like that ever happened again while they were here.

 

     “Well then I hope you’re ready for the argument on that one. I’ve already been working on my part, but they’re going to go right to you and Owen and point out that you two came back, that you two are still here and everything is just fine.” Karen sighed.

 

     “I’ve got to talk to them.” Claire mumbled, handing the book she’d been holding in an almost death grip back to her sister. “After Gray’s birthday, I’m talking to them before you all leave.”

 

     “I just hope they listen.” Karen’s voice was just above a whisper.

 

    “Mom!” Gray’s called out as soon as the hotel door swung open. “It’s lunchtime!”

 

     “Alright, let’s go get something to eat.” Karen relented.

 

* * *

 

 

     By the end of the day when Owen had to handle Blue’s feedings in front of the public, his mind was still racing with the hundreds of questions everyone asked about Blue. _What happened to her sisters? Why does she have a blue streak? How fast can she run?_ All of these questions and more were still stuck in his head and it left Owen beyond exhausted. Despite his long and draining day between the crowds and training the girls, Owen enjoyed going out to dinner with Claire, Karen, and the boys who recounted every single thing they did that day. Claire had managed to pull him aside and tell him what she’d learned earlier from Karen, specifically what Zach was looking into, but they’d both agreed to let the boys enjoy their time here until after Gray’s birthday. After dinner, all Owen wanted to do was go home and crash in his bed, holding Claire close to his side and enjoying the fact that he only had to worry about his girls tomorrow and not the crowds; but Karen managed to pull him aside in the hotel suite while Claire was talking with the boys in the living room.

 

     “So, when are you going to ask her?” Karen whispered, keeping an eye on her sister from the doorway.

 

     A few weeks before Karen and the boys came to the island, Owen had called Karen and told her he wanted to ask Claire to marry him. They’d been together since all hell broke loose and he couldn’t imagine the rest of his life going anywhere without Claire in the picture. In all honesty, Owen was never sure that he would ever ask someone to marry him, but when he met Claire years ago, he started to consider it – now there he was, ring already bought and hidden from Claire’s prying eyes back in the bungalow and he’d asked Karen to help with figuring out the perfect way to propose to Claire.

 

     “The day after Gray’s Birthday, it’s our anniversary.” Owen answered with a smile.

 

     “I thought it was in December?” Karen asked curiously.

 

     “Well, that anniversary, yeah. I mean it’s the anniversary of our first date, I thought it was time that day got remembered for something good.” Owen shrugged.

 

     “That’s actually kinda sweet.” Karen smiled. “Please tell me your not going to propose to her where you had your first date, because while giant margarita’s are great, I don’t think Claire will appreciate being proposed to in Margaritaville.”

 

     “No, I’ve got something else in mind, trust me.” Owen assured her.

 

     “Alright.” Claire nodded.

 

     “Hey, Owen!” Zach called out from the living room. “They’ve got you and Blue on TV.”

 

     “Great, they film me now.” Owen grumbled as he could see himself clear as day on the channel that the park kept up and running with all the highlights of the day.


	7. The Girls

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Pretty sure those deleted scenes that leaked yesterday have officially destroyed me in every way possible, they were amazing and god I can't wait to get my hands on that blu ray and just watch them over and over again until the end of time. But yeah, anyway, enough of my blabbing, here's the next chapter and man, as soon as I finish this story I'm going to write so much Clawen fluff because the urge is just bubbling over after those deleted scenes!

          Claire had spent years on the island, but she had never seen so much of it until the boys and Karen had shown up. Sure, she would go from place to place, wherever they needed her at the time, but it was mostly in the offices, the lab, or even somewhere down Main Street. Seldom did Claire ever venture out towards the actual attractions, much less go on any of the rides. She had kept the park up and running, but she had never seen the park from the eyes of the thousands of tourists who visited the island every day. The boys had dragged her and Karen on nearly every ride they could reach in the few days they had already been there. But now, it was Gray’s birthday, and Claire already knew what Gray wanted to see before he even asked at breakfast this morning.

 

     “Can we go see the new raptors?” Gray asked as soon as he managed to scarf down all his bacon, Zach stayed quiet beside him and kept eating, but Claire could feel his gaze fixated on her as well, waiting for an answer.

 

     “I already talked with Owen and your mom.” Claire said as she cast a quick glance over at Karen, ensuring that she hadn’t changed her mind in the past half hour. “As soon we’re all done with breakfast, we’re going to meet Owen over by the girls and then we’ll go see Blue.”

 

     “Thank you Aunt Claire!” Gray bolted out of his seat and hugged Claire as tightly as he could, Claire couldn’t help but smile and hug him back, catching a glimpse of Zach smiling now too.

 

     “Are the new raptors as smart as Blue and her sisters used to be?” Zach asked curiously while Gray sat back down in his seat, eating his breakfast just a bit quicker now.

 

     “From what I’ve seen of them they are, but just because Owen is training these girls for the public doesn’t mean either of you are going to get any closer to them, okay? They’re still vicious when they want to be.” Claire had hoped the boys would have assumed that right away, but not wanting to leave it to chance, she knew she had to make it clear that these raptors were still as dangerous as Blue and her sisters had been, and as dangerous as Blue still was.

 

     “No, I get it, vicious meat-eating dinosaurs.” Zach said with a nod.

 

     “What are their names again?” Gray asked between mouthfuls of eggs.

 

     “Gray, sweetie, chew before you talk.” Karen said.

 

     “India, Juliette, Kyla, and Lori.” Claire told him. “It’s okay Gray, you don’t have to eat so fast, Owen’s with the girls until two, we’ve got plenty of time.”

 

     Gray nodded and started to eat his food a little slower.

 

     Claire could tell that the boys were excited, they had spent the past three days waiting patiently for their chance to see the raptors; she just wished that they could have been excited about anything else instead of being up close with the dinosaurs again.

 

* * *

 

 

     The girls were getting better; Owen had to give them credit for that, despite being torn between the two paddocks now more than he ever had been before. They were all remembering their commands, especially now that India had proven to her sister once and for all that _she_ was the beta of the pack. The girls were working together like a well-oiled machine, and despite all of this being put on display sooner rather than later, Owen couldn’t help but be a little proud of how much progress they had made.

 

     “Uh, Owen?” Trevor had piped up beside him. “Are there supposed to be people out here already?”

 

     Owen looked down off the side of the building and saw Claire’s car pulling up, with Gray running out as soon as the car came to a stop, and Zach not far behind him.

 

     “It’s alright, it’s Claire’s nephews.” Owen clapped his hand on Trevor’s shoulder. “Do me a favor, if either of them talk to you, try and make the job sound incredibly difficult, even more than it already is. Especially to the older one.”

 

     “Why?” Trevor asked, more than a bit confused.

 

     “Well, you’ve seen Claire on some of her bad days when she comes out here, right?” Owen asked and waited for Trevor to nod. “Imagine if one of her nephews decided to become an intern here and something happened to one of them, do you really want to _ever_ see that side of Claire?”

 

     “I get what you mean.” Trevor said, though he now had a slightly horrified look in his eyes that was exactly what Owen needed right now.

 

     “Thanks Trevor.” Owen said as he made his way towards the stairs. “Just remember; horrible job, vicious animals with snarling teeth, that sort of thing.”

 

     By the time Owen made it down the stairs, Gray and Zach were already talking to Barry through the security pen and he could see them trying to catch a glimpse of the girls behind him. Before Owen even made his way over to where Claire and Karen were standing, he could already see the worried looks on their faces.

 

     “Why couldn’t you work at the petting zoo?” Karen asked.

 

     “I don’t know, have you seen how big some of those babies get before they move them out? Imagine if one of them just decided to roll over onto you.” Owen answered with a cheeky grin that made both Karen and Claire roll their eyes in response.

 

     “Better broken legs than missing limbs.” Karen mumbled.

 

     “Owen, you’re going to talk to them about how _dangerous_ all of this is, right?” Claire was nervous, Owen could tell from the way she bit down on her lower lip and couldn’t stop fiddling around with her necklace that she was not far from becoming a nervous wreck with the boys so close dinosaurs that had the potential for killing. He knew she’d done her best to keep them around the herbivores for the past couple of days, but he also knew she couldn’t keep them away from the dangerous ones forever.

 

     “I’ve got it handled, don’t worry about it.” Owen assured her with a quick kiss to her forehead. He was relieved to see her crack a smile, but he knew she wouldn’t calm down for a while.

 

     “Hey Owen, can we get a look at the girls now?” Zach called out.

 

     “When did he start calling them that?” Owen asked curiously.

 

     “Just now.” Claire groaned.

 

     “Yeah, we can look at them from the viewing center, it’s around the other side.” Owen answered Zach and wrapped his arm around Claire’s waist, pulling her a bit closer now.

 

     “Have they tested that new glass out yet? I know they put in new panels after Blue tried to break her glass a while ago.” Claire asked.

 

     “They have, it’s fine. It’s as thick as the glass they’ve got in the T-Rex paddock now, none of them are getting through it.” Owen reassured her. “Come on, let’s get over there before they try to sneak in the security cage.”

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

     “How long do the raptors live for?” Zach asked as he watched the girls roaming around their paddock through the glass, Owen noted that Zach hadn’t looked away from the raptors yet since they got in the viewing center.

 

     Gray was just as hypnotized by them as well, but Owen noticed that for once it was Gray who was silent and Zach who was asking all the questions, which in itself was completely unusual.

 

     “We haven’t figured that one out yet, none of them have lived long enough in the park for us to see. The lab keeps saying something about twenty-five years or so like the T-Rex but, no one really knows yet.” Owen shrugged.

 

     In truth, none of the dinosaurs in Jurassic World had truly been around long enough to see how long their species can live for. The Indominus had done a good job of killing most of the older dinosaurs since the younger ones could get away quicker, not to mention Blue being the only eldest velociraptor left. The lab was just guessing at this point as to how long they all could live, all that was really certain was that the T-Rex didn’t have many years left to her and they were already preparing for the day she died.

 

     “Have these ones tried to get out?” Zach asked.

 

    “Not as much as Blue and her sisters did, but they’re smart animals, they know there’s more to see outside of their gates. They’ve tried but that’s why they have us here, we have to be smarter than them.” Owen said, he could feel Claire’s gaze boring holes into the back of his head, he knew he had to say something a little more discouraging. “Everyday though you have to be on your toes. The girls watch us like hawks, looking for a weak spot wherever they can. One day they just might find that weak spot at the right time and get out, I don’t really look forward to that day but I know it can happen.”

 

     Zach just nodded and kept his eyes on the raptors.

 

     “You know…I’ve gotta ask, why so interested in the dinosaurs all the sudden?” Owen had been told about the internship application that had been found in his room, but if he had learned anything from working with animals and watching people for years, it was that the best approach was usually the non-direct one – especially when it came to teenagers.

 

     “I don’t know.” Zach immediately shut down, though still keeping his interest in the dinosaurs in front of him as Barry was trying to get the girls to go to their harnesses in the safety cage.

 

     “If it’s about facing a fear or something, I can understand that. Lots of people came back to the island for that very reason, your Aunt Claire and I included.” Owen knew he was getting risky now, Zach had already shut down and trying to pry could only make things worse.

 

     “I’m not afraid of them.” Zach stated, as he finally looked away from the glass once the last of the girls were harnessed up, and walked off towards the other end of the center where they were already hanging up pictures of the girls as babies, just as what they had done in Blue’s paddock.

 

     “He gets like that when you ask him that.” Gray said without skipping a beat. “I’m scared of them still a little bit, that’s why I wanted to come back.”

 

     “Does seeing them behind the glass make you feel any better?” Owen asked curiously.

 

     “Not really.” Gray sighed. “Can we go see Blue?”

 

     Owen could tell from how abruptly he changed the topic that he didn’t want to talk about it anymore than Zach wanted to.

 

     “Yeah, sure, I’ve got to head over there anyway. It’s almost feeding time.” Owen said as Gray walked off towards his brother.

 

     “What happened?” Claire asked curiously while Karen head over to the boys.

 

     “Nothing, just trying to see if I could get the boys to talk a little bit. Gray did but all Zach really wanted to know was stuff about the raptors. The minute I asked him what was wrong he just shut down and walked off.” Owen sighed.

 

     “It’s alright, we’ve got time with them still. I figured tomorrow you could talk to them a bit more.” Claire shrugged.

 

     “Tomorrow?” Owen asked a bit worried.

 

     Tomorrow had him worried enough; it was supposed to be the day that Owen would _finally_ ask Claire to marry him. He’d been testing out the waters with her over the time they’d been together, her thoughts on marriage slowly changing until he was sure that she’d at least consider marrying him. Barry and Trevor had said they would handle the girls, there were no feedings tomorrow and with how well the girls had been progressing, they could afford to miss a day of training. But Owen knew Claire, and she knew that Owen couldn’t exactly miss a day of work right now, and that him suddenly getting a day off would be more than suspicious.

 

     “Is tomorrow not good? I thought since you weren’t feeding Blue tomorrow that things would be a bit easier but I can have them wait-“

 

     “No, it’s fine.” Owen cut her off. “I’ll take the boys tomorrow, show them how these guys are, keep them safe.”

 

     “Are you sure?” Claire asked, hesitantly.

 

     “Yeah, it’ll be fine. You and Karen go spend some sister time together, I’ll take the boys, everything will work out.” Owen reassured her with a quick kiss.

 

     “Okay.” Claire said.

 

     “We better get going, I’ve got a raptor to feed.” Owen said.

 

     “Since when do you ever care about being on time?” Claire asked with an amused smirk.

 

     “Since they started making me feed a hungry raptor in front of a couple hundred people every other day who might look a bit tasty to her if I wait too long.” Owen mumbled.


	8. The Inevitable

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This chapter kinda got away from me and wow, it ended up super long. Hopefully that’s a good thing, right? I hope you guys like this chapter!

     Owen had been going through with the shows for a few weeks now, and he knew a pattern was forming. ACU would line up along the top of the catwalk, circling all around and stun guns aimed down into the cage, the people from outside would start filing into the viewing center, and the rest of the staff would either be in the security cage or up on the catwalk between ACU. Owen knew just how horrible patterns were, because Blue was studying every single one of the; she knew Owen was up on the catwalk, she knew there were stun guns on her, and she knew there were people in the center that were to be protected at all times. Patterns were dangerous around something as smart as Blue, and no matter how many times Owen had begged everyone to do just something a little different to throw her off, people happened to be creatures of habit.

 

     He watched the glass nervously, waiting for the screen to rise and the music to swell as it always had. Only this time, Owen could feel his nerves getting to him because he _knew_ something was off with Blue the minute he saw her today. Now she was there, behaving and watching everyone up on the catwalk, and today of all days there was the woman he loved most in the entire world along with her family – his future family – behind that glass.

 

     “Don’t start your shit today, Blue.” Owen mumbled, though he swore Blue might have picked up on part of that sentence, glaring at him before scanning the circle of stun guns that were formed above her.

 

     The video would be ending in a few minutes, Owen had it timed down to almost the exact second as to when the screen would start rising, and Blue was paying much more attention to the window than the bucket of food above her head by him. Unable to take the tension any longer, Owen took the few minutes he had left and made his way over to the leader of the ACU team on the other side of the catwalk – Kate.

 

     “Show starts in two.” Kate stated as soon as Owen walked up to her, her eyes locked on Blue and watching her every move.

 

     “I know, but I need you guys to move around.” Owen said with a sense of urgency that captured Kate’s attention.

 

     “What, why?” She asked confused.

 

     “Because I’ve been taking care of Blue for years and I know when she’s going to try something. She’s eyeing that window as her escape route and right now we’ve got one hundred and fifty people behind that glass in her way. Move around and throw her off, if she tries anything hopefully we can keep her away from the glass long enough to get everyone in there out.” Owen explained.

 

     Kate thought about it for a moment before giving Owen a nod and turning to the soldier next to her.

 

     “Alright, come on, let’s get everyone to start switching around, we’ve got a code three, possible containment breech.” Kate barked out her order as the soldiers started to switch places immediately.

 

     As Owen made his way back to his spot on the catwalk, he could tell all the sudden movement was throwing off Blue, knowing they had caught on to her plan.

 

     “Come on Blue, let’s just get this over with.” Owen said as he watched the screen rise in the window, and among the crowd of people, he could already spot the boys, Karen, and Claire.

 

     He went through his speech that he said at the beginning of every show; it changed a bit from every other one, mostly since Owen refused to write it down and forgot parts of the original speech. This particular speech had ended up much shorter than the others, a majority of Owen’s attention being distracted by how shifty Blue was becoming and how ACU was watching Blue intently. As soon as Owen finished his speech, Blue stopped looking around and locked her eyes on the gate to the security cage, she had found her new weakness.

 

     “Blue!” Owen called out, followed by a whistle. He captured her attention for a few second before she bolted towards the security door. “Hold your fire!” Owen called out over the radio, hearing ACU on it already, all too ready to take Blue down. “Lock down the damn visitors center, keep everyone in there, use the stun guns on Blue to draw her away from the gate, _do not tranquilize her_.”

 

     Owen didn’t bother to listen to their responses, he saw half the team on the catwalk listening to his order and started to shot their stun guns down at Blue, the other half of the team marching down the steps behind him, following him over to the security gate. By the time he reached the gate he saw that Blue was doing her best to resist the stun guns, though whenever one hit her she’d turn around and his before returning to try and break through the new locks they had put in the paddock. Owen knew as soon as he saw them putting in the new gates for Blue’s paddock that they were a bad idea, she could break through these easier, though engineering had sworn she’d never get through. They were supposed to be doors that made it easier for Owen to get in if there were ever an emergency with Blue, if she ever got sick or something along those lines, instead all they had done was make it easier for her to get out.

 

     “We have to shoot her!” Owen didn’t even realize Kate had followed this half of the team downstairs, but she was beside him now, her tranquilizer locked on Blue just as all the others were.

 

     “Give them a minute, see if they can get her away from the gate.” Owen protested.

 

     Not even a minute later, Owen heard the lock on the door bust, and just as Blue opened the door; Kate shot her down with a tranquilizer. Blue charged at the gate, her jaws just inches away from Owen’s face as she pressed her nose through the bars. He didn’t think he was standing that close until he felt something sharp scrape his arm, only to realize that Blue had managed to get one of her claws through the bars and get to him. Moments later, Owen could see the drugs start working on Blue as she slowly stopped trying to struggle against the gate until she slid down onto the floor unconscious.

 

     “Go get medical down here now, they’re gonna want to look at his arm.” Kate ordered the gunman next to her before he called out over his radio for nearby medical staff to make their way to Blue’s paddock.

 

     The scratch didn’t hurt until Owen moved his arm to look at it, he saw the blood slowly start dripping from the wound, and from just one look at it he knew they’d want to put stitches in it.

 

     “Shit.” Owen hissed out; Claire would lose her mind as soon as she saw thing, he knew she’d freak out. He still remembered the day he came home with little scratches all over from when India and her sisters were still babies, just learning how to climb all over him. She nearly went into a full-blown panic attack over that, he could only imagine how she would react to this.

 

     “Yeah, that’s not gonna heal up pretty.” Kate sighed as she grabbed a nearby rag and handed it to Owen to keep pressure on the new wound. “They’re going to give you plenty of stitches for that.”

 

     “Great.” Owen grumbled.

 

     “ _Is it clear for the guests to be released?_ ” Owen heard one of the soldier’s voices call out over the radio, though he swore he heard another voice in the background, a familiar and angry voice.

 

     “All clear.” Kate answered back.

 

     As soon as they allowed the guests out, Owen saw them slowly pass by, most of them pausing to get a glimpse of what happened. Everyone took their time despite the near crisis that was just averted.

 

     “OWEN!” He could hear Claire calling out before he saw her running over towards him. “Oh my god, Owen.”

 

     “It’s fine, it’s just a scratch. I’m fine.” He tried to assure her, seeing the tears well up in her eyes already while she froze a good five feet away from him.

 

     “Uh, Grady?” Kate nudged him a bit, her eyes locked on his arm.

 

     “Shit.” Owen sighed as soon as he saw how quickly the wound had started bleeding despite the pressure he kept on it with the rag, some of his blood already dripping down out of the rag and onto his shirt and the ground.

 

     Owen caught a glimpse of Karen and the boys keeping their distance in the background. Karen looked shocked and frozen in fear; Zach just looked blank, unsure of what to do or how to react to what was in front of him. Gray didn’t hesitate and made his way right over to Owen, searching through the pouch he kept on him, similar to the one he had his first time on the island from what Owen could remember, and started pulling out gauze pads and handing them over to Owen.

 

     “Thanks, kid.” Owen said, though Gray just nodded and took a few steps back once medical finally made their way over to him.

 

     Medical made him take a seat, and it wasn’t until he finally sat down that he felt a bit dizzy. He didn’t know when Claire had managed to make her way past them and sat herself beside him, eerily quiet and resting her head on Owen’s shoulder while her fingers intertwined with his on his free hand. When they started stitching him up, Owen tried to keep himself from letting loose a string of curse words that would have been less than appropriate in front of Zach and Gray. Instead he tried to keep his gaze fixated on Claire, pressing kisses to the top of her head though she remained silent and unmoving, save for her thumb that started rubbing circles into the top of his hand. Owen knew she had started letting herself cry at some point, watching, as she’d wipe away stray tears and attempting to hide how red the tip of her nose had gotten.

 

     “I’m okay, Claire.” Owen finally told her once they’d finished stitching him up, he lost count along the way just how many they had to put in his arm before they started wrapping his arm up.

 

     “For now.” Claire whispered out, her voice breaking in certain places from how much she had cried.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     “I don’t think that you realize _the asset_ was almost out of containment because of something _your_ engineers designed into the new paddock! She would have never gotten that far if you just kept the old gates!” Claire was shouting at the top of her lungs now, as soon as she had gotten him home to the bungalow and sent Karen and the boys back to main park, she had gotten ahold of her cell phone and started yelling at whoever she had to until she had gotten Lydia Carson on the phone; which had only made her yelling worse if he was being honest.

 

     Owen kept his distance, sitting on the sofa in the living room and waiting for Claire to get off the phone before he even attempted to calm her down.

 

     “Fine.” He heard Claire finally relent. “Just make sure the new gates are as stable as the old ones were.”

 

     Claire finally walked into the living room and just hovered over Owen, her gaze fixated on his bandaged up arm. She had stopped crying as soon as they got back to the bungalow, the tears had then turned to anger and Owen knew better than getting in the way of that. Now, he had no idea what route Claire would go, he just hoped more than anything that she would start to calm down back to some normal version of herself.

 

     “How’s your arm?” She finally asked.

 

     “It’s fine.” Owen winced when he tried to move his arm.

 

     “Don’t move it.” Claire carefully sat down beside him now and gingerly rested her hand on the bandages. “I don’t want you to bust open those stitches.”

 

     “Good luck with that, I always hated stitches.” Owen said with a smirk, attempting to lighten the mood a bit, but judging from the glare she gave him, he knew she wasn’t ready for joking around about all of this just yet. “It’s just a scratch Claire, I’ll live.”

 

     “A scratch would have been if you just needed and Band-Aid and that was it. This is a gash in the side of your arm that needed twelve stitches!” Claire snapped.

 

     “Really, twelve?” Owen asked.

 

     “You kept moving every five seconds, they put two extra ones in just in case.” Claire sighed. “You could have been hurt way worse than this, Owen. ACU was there and you had them using the stun guns on her, they should have put her down before she even busted through that first gate!”

 

    “I know.” Owen admitted. There was no use in fighting Claire when he knew she was right. “Blue should have been put down as soon as she went for the gate, I know, I messed up.”

 

     “Why didn’t you let them put her down?” Claire asked, Owen could see now just how hard she was trying to keep herself from crying, and if there was anything Owen hated more than anything in the world, it was knowing he’d made Claire this upset.

 

     “She was trusting me again, like she used to. I didn’t think she ever would but…she was almost back to how she used to be when she had her sisters, before the Indominus. I thought if the stun guns could lure her back into the cage then I could just find a way to calm her down instead of knocking her out. I thought the old Blue was coming back but I guess that was just wishful thinking.” Owen shrugged.

 

     Claire nodded before intertwining her fingers with Owen’s again, holding onto him as if he were going to be stolen from her at any second. “They’re closing Blue’s paddock for two weeks so they can get the new gates installed, they’re going to put her in one of the temporary enclosures until it’s done. They’ll probably try and keep her tranquilized for most of it.”

 

     “Okay.” Owen said. “How are the boys?”

 

     “The boys are…they’re alright I guess. They were silent the whole way back to Main Street until Gray started talking about going to see the Mosasaurus. I think Karen took them out there to go see that, I said I’d meet up with them later to have cake and give Gray his present once I knew you were alright back here.” Claire tried to keep her voice steady, but own could hear her voice tremble a bit.

 

     “When are we leaving for the cake and presents tonight?” Owen asked.

 

     “What do you mean?” Claire asked confused. “ _You_ are staying here and getting some rest.”

 

     “Claire, it’s a few stitches. I didn’t go through surgery or get my arm amputated, I think I can handle a thirteen year olds birthday.” Owen protested, though Claire kept her glare on him.

 

     “I want you to get some rest Owen, I don’t want you moving around that arm more than you need to, and I swear I will have them give me a sling for that arm if you pop those stitches open even once.” Claire warned him. “Right now, I just want you to go lie down and I promise I’ll bring you back some cake later, okay?”

 

     “Alright.” Owen gave in, knowing that she was letting him off easy; if Claire truly had it her way she’d more than likely wire the entire bungalow with nanny cameras to keep an eye on him while he’s supposed to be getting some rest.

 

* * *

 

 

     Claire wasn’t exactly sure how she had let the boys talk her into having cake at the bungalow. She had said that Owen was alright, that he was supposed to be getting some rest despite him texting her every five minutes that told her otherwise. But, halfway through Gray’s birthday dinner, Gray started saying how he wished Owen was there with them and Zach agreeing with him. It wasn’t until Claire broke down and said they could have cake with Owen at the bungalow that she realized two teenage boys had just guilt tripped her while Karen sat beside her with a smirk, knowing exactly what her boys had just done.

 

     “You might as well get used to it for when you have kids one day, if they turn out anything like these two they will be the masters of guilt trips.” Karen assured her.

 

     “Good to know.” Claire mumbled as she opened up the front door.

 

     “How was the party?” Owen called out from the sofa. She wasn’t surprised to see him out of bed at all and ignoring her order to get some sleep.

 

     “Well, I was convinced to bring the party to you.” Claire sighed as the boys walked into the bungalow, proceeding to sit down on either side of Owen and pretend to be watching whatever he had on the TV. “Come on boys, let’s have some cake.”

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

     Despite all that had happened that day, Claire was relieved that Owen was still in one piece, and that Gray had still managed to have a good birthday. The boys had their cake and Gray opened up his presents, Owen had managed to keep his stitches from busting open despite all the movement; and after Karen and the boys had left with Owen still promising to take the boys around the park tomorrow despite Claire’s warning glares, it took all the energy Claire had left to finally get Owen to lie down in bed. Once he finally fell asleep, Claire was sure some of the medication they had put him on had him talking in his sleep, Owen mumbling out ‘ _I love you_ ’, ‘ _I’m sorry_ ’, and ‘ _I’m the luckiest man in the word to have you, Claire_ ’. She couldn’t help but smile and watch him for a bit while she got changed for bed.

 

     “Will you marry me, Claire?” Owen mumbled out.

 

     “Maybe when you wake up, sleepy head.” Claire whispered with a smile before pressing a kiss to his temple.


	9. Try To Relax

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: One more chapter to go! I'm working on it as we speak. I have no idea what I'm going to write for these two once this story is done, but I'm sure I'll figure something out. I'm sure when I finally get the movie once it comes out and spend hours watching all the special features I'll think of something :P I hope you guys like this chapter, I should have the last one up sometime later this week! xoxo

     First thing in the morning, right as Owen was getting ready, he managed to pop open his stitches; not even twenty minutes later Claire had his arm in a sling despite his many protests.

 

     “You’re going to be running around the park with the boys all day and you expect me to believe you won’t pop open those stitches again?” Claire asked in disbelief, she knew how Owen was, and she knew that unless she put that arm of his in a sling, he’d be back in medical before lunchtime getting his arm sewn up – again.

 

     “Fine.” Owen grumbled. “Are you meeting us at the Creation Center later?”

 

     “Yes, I have to go by there later anyway and check on a few things in the lab.” Claire sighed. “Are you sure you can handle the boys all by yourself? Karen and I could come with you, you could still go off and talk to them when you think they’ll talk.”

 

     “What, you think I can’t handle two teenagers?” Owen asked with an amused grin.

 

     “Well, if you could use both arms you might be able to handle them.” Claire protested.

 

     “We’ll be fine.” Owen said. “You and Karen go have some sister time, relax a little bit out on the beach or something, I’ve got the boys.”

 

     “Alright, but if _anything_ happens and you need us, just call me and I’ll be there as quickly as I can, okay?” Claire reminded him. She knew she was being overprotective of all of them right now, but after seeing what happened to Owen yesterday, Claire just couldn’t shake the feeling of wanting to hover over everyone she loved and make sure everyone stayed in one piece.

 

     “I will, I promise.” Owen leaned in and pressed a kiss to Claire’s forehead. “Go try and relax.”

 

     “Yeah, right, like that’s going to happen.” Claire mumbled.

 

* * *

 

 

     The beginning of their day had started out mostly quiet, at least of any real conversation. Owen would catch the boys giving his arm a lingering glance every once in a while, though almost everyone he came across in the park so far that day had been glaring at his wrapped up arm.

 

     “I feel like a walking target with this stupid thing on.” Owen complained when they had stopped back on Main Street around lunchtime.

 

     “At least it’ll keep you from opening up your stitches.” Gray pointed out while happily eating his ice cream.

 

     “Now you sound like your Aunt Claire.” Owen sighed.

 

     “Does it hurt?” Zach asked.

 

     “Honestly, it stings like a son of a bitch more than anything else right now.” Owen admitted.

 

     “You shouldn’t say bitch.” Gray said, Owen couldn’t help but smirk at the kid.

 

     “She could have killed you.” Zach stated, his tone was calm and collected but his eyes were locked on Owen’s arm. “I mean, if she got out and if you were in her way, it doesn’t matter if she knew you or not, she could have killed you if she wanted to.”

 

     Silence lingered in the air between the three of them for a moment, Zach’s words sinking in on Owen as he was finally trying to piece together what the hell was wrong with the boys. Gray had always been fascinated with dinosaurs as far aw Owen could tell, that much would never change even after what had happened on the island; the dinosaurs were a constant mystery slowly unraveling with each dinosaur the labs brought back to life, and Owen knew Gray would always find something interesting about these potentially vicious creatures. Zach, on the other hand, became fascinated with the dinosaurs through Gray’s knowledge of them, but he didn’t care about the facts in the same way Gray had; from what Owen could tell, Zach wanted to learn how fast they could run and how big the dinosaurs got so he knew their strengths and weaknesses.

 

     “Hey Gray, could you grab me an ice cream too?” Owen asked as he grabbed his wallet out of his back pocket and handed it over to Gray. “It’s getting kinda hot out now.”

 

     “Sure.” Gray said without hesitation and took Owen’s wallet.

 

     “Don’t run off with my wallet either.” Owen added with a smirk as Gray walked off.

 

     Once Gray was out of earshot, he knew that this was more than likely his last chance to get Zach to talk.

 

     “Alright, do you want to tell me what’s really going on with you now?” Owen asked outright.

 

     “What do you mean?” Zach asked, the question seeming to pull him out of whatever trance he had gone into while staring at Owen’s bandaged up arm.

 

     “Well, I guess we could start with why you were applying to be an intern somewhere here in the park for next summer.” Owen stated.

 

     “H-how do you know about that?” Zach was genuinely surprised, which Owen supposed was a good thing, he didn’t know that his mother or aunt knew what he had done or what he’d been planning on doing.

 

     “Your mom found it in your room, she told your aunt, who then told me.” Owen shrugged. “It doesn’t really matter now, but…first I should ask what the internship was even for. I know it wasn’t for the raptors; we weren’t looking for interns over there yet.”

 

     Zach looked a bit defeated, lowering his head just a bit trying to avoid Owen’s gaze. “Promise you won’t freak out?”

 

     “That means it’s something bad, doesn’t it?” Owen asked, Zach didn’t need to respond for Owen to know. “Alright, I promise.”

 

     “It was for the T-Rex. I didn’t even tell Gray about it, I figured I wouldn’t have to if they didn’t take me, there’d be no need to freak everyone out if I never even got it in the first place.” Zach mumbled.

 

     “Right, because not telling your family that you applied to be an intern for the biggest carnivore on the whole damn island would make it easier.” Owen was trying to keep himself calm, keep himself from yelling at Zach just how stupid the whole idea sounded.

 

     “Look, I know it’s stupid and dangerous, hell, this whole island is based off of a stupid and dangerous idea.” Zach protested. “I just thought that even if something went wrong again at least I’d be here, I could help do something about it if I knew something about them.”

 

     Zach’s confession only confirmed what Owen had thought. Zach wanted to learn about the dinosaurs so he wouldn’t feel so helpless if anything like the Indominus had ever happened again.

 

     “So that’s what it’s about then, you want to know how to stop them if they get out?” Owen asked, Zach meekly nodded, avoiding eye contact still with Owen. “I hate to break it to you Zach, but you can think you know all there is to know about one of these things and they can still surprise you. It doesn’t matter if you earn their trust or watch them from behind glass, if they get out again it’s not gonna help if you know how fast they run or how many teeth they have in their head.”

 

     “At least I’d be here, at least I wouldn’t have to wonder if you and Aunt Claire were alive or dead if something ever happened like that again.” Zach was trying to protect his point of view.

 

     “Think about your brother and your mom, if you came here to the island you’d be doing that to them. They would be wondering everyday if you were alive or if the T-Rex turned you into a chew toy yet. Do you want them to worry about you like that?” Owen asked.

 

     “Gray would get it, he wants to be here too.” Zach blurted out.

 

     “Yeah, but something tells me Gray doesn’t want to be face to face with them every day.” Owen had expected that Gray would want to be on the island as well, but he already knew where Gray would want to be.

 

     “No, he want’s to be in the lab.” Zach sighed.

 

     “Which I hate to admit it, but compared to the T-Rex idea, his idea is a hell of a lot safer.” Owen said. “Though I think everyone would prefer if both of you stayed off the island.”

 

     Zach glared at Owen before shifting his gaze out towards the crowd, Owen could tell he was more than likely expecting a speech like this ever since he put in the application.

 

     “But,” Owen began with a sigh. “You’ll be eighteen in a couple of months or so, right?”

 

     “Yeah.” Zach answered with a bit of hesitation, unsure of where Owen was going with the conversation now.

 

     “When I was eighteen I was out on my own, I made my own choices, some of them I wish I hadn’t made but, hey, maybe if I hadn’t made them I wouldn’t be here now with your Aunt Claire and you guys. Either way, when your eighteen you can choose whatever the hell you want, it’s part of becoming an adult. If you really want to spend your days here on this island wondering weather or not another dinosaur is gonna break out of it’s cage and start another buffet, that’s up to you; if you want it that badly nothing anyone says will change your mind about it. It’s your call kid, and it’s a choice you’ll have to make all on your own whenever you hear back from them.”

 

     “Thanks.” Zach said after a minute.

 

     “For what?” Owen asked.

 

     “Being honest.” Zach admitted.

 

     Gray returned just at the tail end of the conversation, placing Owen’s wallet and his ice cream on the table in front of him.

 

     “Do you guys wanna see the T-Rex show?” Gray asked. “It starts in ten minutes.”

 

     “Might as well.” Owen smirked as he looked over at Zach. “Want to see the T-Rex?”

 

 

 

* * *

 

    

     “You’ve been staring at your phone for ten minutes now.” Karen sighed, though keeping her eyes on the book she’d brought with her.

 

     “Sorry.” Claire stuffed her cell phone back into her beach bag after making sure for the tenth time that the ringer was turned on high, just in case.

 

     For their sister day together, once Karen had heard Claire had barely set foot on the beautiful beach on the island, she insisted that they spend the day relaxing in the sun. Claire wanted to relax, to be able to enjoy the beautiful sunny day and forget about everything for just a little bit, but after seeing what Blue had done to Owen, Claire found relaxing to be difficult – especially knowing Owen and the boys were god knows where on the island by now.

 

     “Claire, if something goes wrong, the boys will call us or Owen will call you. If something goes terribly wrong inside the park I’m sure you’ll be the first call that the control room will make. Right now, everything is going perfectly fine, all you have to do today, unless a phone call proves otherwise, is enjoy the sunshine for a few hours with your sister, and maybe venture out into the water if it gets too hot.” Karen said.

 

     Claire was more than grateful that her sister seemed to inherit their mothers ability to calm everybody today. All Karen had done was tell her everything she already knew, but hearing it all out loud just brought a sense of peace over Claire, something she desperately needed after yesterday.

 

     “You’re right.” Claire stated.

 

     “Besides, we’ll see them all later at the Creation Center. I think Owen and the boys can handle being on their own for a few hours.” Karen assured her.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     After spending the day with the boys, Owen swore that somehow the island had gotten bigger, or at least it seemed that way. He had seen enough of the T-Rex to hold him over for a lifetime; but after seeing the other dinosaurs he seldom got to see – such as the Triceratops and seeing the Gallimimus’ running through the valley – the park felt a bit larger than it had before. The last show they went to for the day had been the Mosasaurus, which had left all three of them completely soaked, and though it felt good on a hot day, Owen brought the boys to the hotel so they could change before they followed him out to the bungalow so he could do the same.

 

     “What’s this?” Gray asked as he picked up a tiny black box that was left on the kitchen counter.

 

     “I put that there so I wouldn’t forget it.” Owen took the box from Gray and put it in his pocket, he had to admit with all the chaos running through his head with his nerves building up over tonight, he almost forgot entirely about remembering the most important piece of proposing – the ring.

 

     “But what is it?” Gray asked again.

 

     “Well, I’ve been with your Aunt Claire for a while now, and I love her…a lot, so tonight down at the lab I’m going to ask her to marry me.” Owen explained, saying it out loud to someone, aside from coordinating certain things with Karen, made it a little more surreal, it almost made everything a bit more nerve-racking.

 

     “Seriously?” Zach asked with a hint of a grin on his face.

 

     “Yeah, hopefully she says yes.” Owen felt the nerves sink in even more now, he didn’t want to mess anything up, but the sheer thought of proposing to the woman he loved more than anything else in the world was anxious enough alone, much less actually doing it.

 

     “So, does that mean we have to call you Uncle Owen now?” Gray asked curiously.

 

     “If you want.” Owen shrugged. “If she says yes that is.”

 

     “Pretty sure Aunt Claire is gonna marry you.” Zach stated.

 

     “If she doesn’t yell at me for taking that stupid sling off first.” Owen smirked.


	10. One Last Thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So this is it! Thank you guys for sticking with the story this long, I hope you've enjoyed reading the story! I'm not sure what I'm gonna write from here on out for these two, I'll probably stick to one-shots unless anything inspires me to write another multi-chapter thing. xoxo

     With half of her days off gone already, Claire couldn’t help but realize just how strange it was to be back in the lab after spending the past five days doing nothing other than be with her family. She almost half expected to walk back into chaos, but everything had continued to run as normal. Claire liked being back in the lab, Karen at her side and questioning the scientists to death about everything, proving that Gray’s curiosity came from her; all the distractions in the lab with paperwork to be signed and later filed kept her from worrying about Owen and the boys – who were running ten minutes late already.

 

     “I’m sure they’re fine, they probably went to another show at the last minute.” Karen tried to assure Claire, though she could detect a hint of worry in her sisters tone.

 

     “Sure, probably.” Claire nodded, resisting the urge to pull out her cell phone and call all three of them to figure out if everything was alright. “But…it wouldn’t hurt to check, right?”

 

     Karen gave Claire the all too familiar look she’d seen most of the day, whenever she mentioned calling Owen or the boys she would cast a glare at her; though Claire hardly thought it was fair since it seemed perfectly fine for her to text the boys throughout the day.

 

     “I’m calling Owen.” Claire finally broke down and grabbed her phone, hitting Owen’s name in her phone and patiently waiting for him to pick up.

 

     It took four rings for him to finally pick up his phone, and once he answered, it wasn’t Owen on the line.

 

     “Hey Aunt Claire.” Zach answered, he sounded happy for once which Claire hoped meant that their day had gone well.

 

     “Zach, where’s Owen?” Claire asked, a bit concerned.

 

     “He’s driving, we saw the last Mosasaurus show for the day and drenched. We got changed and Owen had to get changed too.” Zach explained.

 

     “Oh, okay. You guys on the way?” Claire asked.

 

     “Yeah, we’re headed there now.” Zach said.

 

     “Alright, I’ll see you guys when you get here, love you guys.” Claire felt more relieved already.

 

     “Love you too Aunt Claire.” Zach said and she could hear Owen and Gray in the background chiming in as well.

 

     “Feel better now?” Karen asked with a grin once Claire had hung up the phone.

 

     “Yes, much better actually.” Claire gave her a smug smile. “They saw the Mosasaurus show and got soaking wet, they’re on the way.”

 

     “See, I told you. Boys have no track of time, all they were thinking about was getting as much fun squeezed into the day as possible.” Karen shrugged. “Did they have fun?”

 

     “Sounds like they did.” Claire said.

 

     “Well, that’s all that matters, right?” Karen asked with a smile.

 

     “Right.” Claire smiled in turn, feeling far more at ease than she had to begin with.

 

 

* * *

 

 

     Owen almost always ran late for things, usually the important ones where timing mattered, he figured it was only fitting at this point that he would be running late to propose to Claire. Once he and the boys finally did get there, he was more than relieved to see that at least Lowery had come through in getting a late T-Rex feeding show to go through, where left the park mostly empty for one of the rare nighttime feedings – especially the Creation Center.  

 

     “I don’t remember there being anything said about a nighttime T-Rex feeding.” Claire said as soon as she walked over to Owen, wrapping him up in a tight hug.

 

    “Must have been a last minute thing.” Owen said nonchalantly as he wrapped his arms around Claire before pressing a few kisses to the top of her head. “Look at you with all these new freckles of yours out, did you have a relaxing day?”

 

     “Tried to, I was just worried about you and the boys.” Claire sighed as she pulled away from Owen and stood up on her tips toes to press a kiss to his lips.

 

     “We’re fine, all in one piece this time, I promise.” Owen grinned. He was so tempted to just lean in and start pressing kisses to her neck and her exposed shoulders that were dotted with freckles, but seeing the boys and Karen in the background made him resist the temptation, if all went well he figured there would be time for all of that later. “How’s the lab running?”

 

     “It’s fine, that reminds me though, I wanted to show all of you the new eggs they’ve got in there. They finally got around to making more Ankylosaurus’ since everything with the Indominus happened.” Claire said.

 

     “You go ahead without us.” Zach blurted out, causing Claire to turn on her heels and stare at her family in confusion. “We’re, uh, we are going to…”

 

     “Check out the wait times!” Gray finished. “For…the restaurant…we’re really hungry, right mom?”

 

     “Hungry teenage boys, what are you gonna do?” Karen smiled while she gave a shrug, Owen would have to remember for the future that Claire’s family made some pretty terrible liars, but hopefully they were believable enough. “We’ll meet you guys there, enjoy the dinosaurs!”

 

     Before Claire could protest, all three of them had walked out the front doors, leaving only Owen and Claire alone there in the Creation Center, an almost eerie feeling considering how full the place usually was.

 

     “Well, I guess it’s just us then for a few minutes at least.” Claire sighed, looking a bit deflated and dejected after the boys and her sister had chosen to leave them behind. “Want to see them?”

 

     “Sure.” Owen agreed as he followed Claire down the hallway and into the lab.

 

     The Ankylosaurus eggs were the only ones currently in incubation, though on the screens Owen could see the labs plans for the future T-Rex with Rexy getting older everyday.

 

     “I haven’t been in here since India and her sisters were born.” Owen said. “It doesn’t really change much in here, does it?”

 

     “Not really.” Claire shrugged as she walked over to the incubator with the eggs. “Did they seem weird to you?”

 

     “Did what seem weird?” Owen asked.

 

     “Karen and the boys? Is something going on that I’m not supposed to know about?” Claire persisted.

 

     “Everything’s fine, they’re probably just tired.” Owen tried to reassure her, he knew with Claire’s ever growing curiosity about how strangely her family acted, that he didn’t have much time to actually propose to her before she would try to run off and see what their problem was.

 

     “They were just acting so weird…” Claire mumbled.

 

     “It’s fine.” Owen stated, wrapping Claire up in his arms and holding her for a minute. “You worry too much, you know that?” He asked with a grin as he glanced down at her.

 

     “I can’t help it.” Claire remarked. “Did you talk to Zach?”

 

     “I did.” Owen nodded, he figured bringing up the fact that Zach wanted to work with the T-Rex was something that could wait for tomorrow. “We had a little talk, I think he gets it but he’ll make his own choice, can’t stop him from doing that.”

 

     “That’s good…I guess.” Claire sighed.

 

     “Hey, do you know what today is?” Owen asked, knowing he should get Claire thinking about other things aside from her nephew planning on working with arguably the world’s most dangerous carnivore.

 

     “…Thursday?” Claire offered, her voice full of confusion.

 

     “Well, yeah, it’s Thursday, but it’s our anniversary too.” Owen grinned.

 

     Claire studied him for a moment with confusion still clear as day written across her features. He figured she was probably trying to piece together why he was saying their anniversary was at the tail end of June instead of in December.

 

     “Owen…it’s June. We started dating before New Year’s.” Claire stated.

 

     “I know that, but it’s the anniversary of probably the worst date you ever went on.” Owen laughed. “And we just so happen to be in the very place where I asked you out on that awful date.”

 

     “Oh god,” Claire groaned though Owen could see a smirk playing on her lips. “I’m just glad you didn’t put on those awful board shorts.”

 

     “Well not everyone can survive a tropical climate in the summer in business attire.” Owen said. “Plus I’d say we’ve come pretty far from that horrible date – you ended up dating me after all.”

 

     “But not after that date, after a genetically modified dinosaur tried to tear us apart.” Claire pointed out.

 

     “It’s a small detail I guess.” Owen smirked. “I’m glad that we ended up here though today, it brings back some memories.”

 

     Owen had never felt this nervous in his entire life, he was trying to keep everything together on the outside to prevent Claire from freaking out, but on the inside his stomach was twisted in knots. This was the one woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with; there was no doubting that, he would give anything to grow old with Claire. And today of all days, she looked radiant, not that she didn’t every other day, but there was just something about her in this moment that stole Owen’s breath away.

 

     “Owen, are you alright?” Claire asked, he didn’t realize he had let such a prolonged silence stretch out between them. “Hey, what happened to your sling?”

 

     “Oh, it got wet after the Mosasaurus show, it’s drying back at the house, I’ll be fine without it for a bit. I swear I won’t do anything to open up the stitches.” Owen promised.

 

     “Alright, well, we should probably go find them now. I thought Gray might have liked seeing in here since I didn’t get to show him last time.” Claire shrugged.

 

     “Wait,” Owen reached out and grabbed Claire’s hand. “There’s, uh, something I wanted to ask you.”

 

     All the time he had spent running through what he wanted to say to Claire in this very moment, and when the time came Owen remembered none of it; he felt frozen in place like a statue with Claire’s eyes on him. Everything felt a bit confusing however once Owen saw Claire start to smile.

 

     “Was it that you wanted to ask me to marry you?” She asked.

 

     “How, wait, how did you even know that?” Owen asked confused.

 

     “You sort of asked me in your sleep last night. I think you were rehearsing what you wanted to say in your sleep but you we’re talking out loud.” Claire explained. “Is that why Karen and the boys were acting weird? And why there’s no one here in the building?”

 

     “Yeah,” Owen admitted with a defeated sigh. “I told Karen a while ago, I told the boys today while I was with them. I also had to tell Lowery, though he seemed less than happy about it for some reason. Either way, I had to tell him to see if he could get his friends down at the T-Rex paddock to do one of those special late night feedings, I knew people would flock to that.”

 

     “That’s…that’s actually the sweetest thing anyone has ever done for me.” Claire was grinning from ear to ear now.

 

     “So…what do we do now?” Owen asked. In all honesty, he had no clue as to what to do now, Claire had it all figured out and though it seemed pointless to even ask her at this point, Owen still felt compelled to get down on one knee and still ask her the right way.

 

     “Well, _technically_ you still haven’t asked me to marry you yet, not while conscious.” Claire smiled. “I could tell you were working pretty hard on what you wanted to say.”

 

     For the first time all day, Owen felt relieved. Somehow, despite still not knowing what answer Claire would give him, just her knowing made it all a bit easier to string his words together. Owen got down on one knee, holding Claire’s hands, and couldn’t help but smile up at her.

 

     “Claire, we’ve been through a lot together over the past couple of years. We met here in this very lab and saw velociraptors hatch, we went on a pretty terrible first date,” Owen’s grin only grew wider when he got Claire to laugh at that bit. “and we also happened to run all over this island looking for those nephews of yours while trying to run away from a mutant killer dinosaur. Then again, without that dinosaur, we probably all wouldn’t be exactly where we are right now; so despite her trying to kill all of us, I have to thank her for pushing us together again.”

 

     “Only you would thank a killer dinosaur in a proposal.” Claire’s eyes were getting a bit watery now, but her smile was still beaming which Owen took as a good sign.

 

     “Well, she made me realize that despite that awful date that I still was absolutely fascinated by the beautiful, and slightly bossy, redhead who threatened to turn my life into a living hell if I was late with paperwork one more time.” Owen grinned. “And everyday I’ve gotten to spend with you since then have been the best days of my life, and I don’t want them to end anytime soon. All of that being said…”

 

     Owen let go of Claire’s hands to pull the small black box he had with him out of his pocket to open it up and hold the diamond ring out to Claire. Her smile was worth all of it, all the hours he spent looking out countless rings until he finally found one he knew Claire would have picked out herself, he supposed it help that he had Karen’s guidance in that area as well.

 

     “Claire Dearing, will you marry me?” Owen finally asked. He had been going over that one simple line for months on end, and now he had finally said them, consciously, out loud.

 

     “Yes, of course I’ll marry you.” Claire couldn’t stop grinning and it made Owen’s heart nearly beat right out of his chest. _She said yes_.

 

     Owen put the ring on Claire’s finger and it felt all the more right when the ring fit perfectly. He carefully got himself up off the floor, ensuring not to pop open his stitches and have Claire worry about him in a moment like this, before wrapping his arms around her and pulling her into a kiss that somehow felt different from all the other kisses before – better almost. Owen knew that if Claire hadn’t pulled away when she had that he would have had a difficult time sitting through dinner without letting his thoughts wander off into thinking about spending the night in bed with his future _wife_ tonight.

 

     “I have to ask because it’s bugging me now, I know you got the people to leave by having the T-Rex feeding, but how did you get everyone in the lab to leave?” Claire asked.

 

     “Lowery again, I may have had him tell a little white lie that the Spinosaurs siblings were sick.” Owen admitted while Claire cast him a glare. “I’ll deal with it tomorrow, but at least we know the way to clear out the lab coats quickly now.”

 

     “Mhmm, well how about we go meet Karen and the boys for dinner finally before the lab coats return?” Claire asked with a grin still plastered on her face.

 

     “Sounds good to me.” Owen said, pressing a kiss to Claire’s forehead. “I love you.”

 

     “I love you too.” Claire beamed.


End file.
